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EDUCATION REFORM. 



REVIEW OF WYSE 



ON 



THE NECESSITY OP 



A NATIONAL SYSTEM OF EDUCATION, 



COMPRISING 



THE SUBSTANCE OF THAT WORK, SO FAR AS RELATES TO COMMON 
SCHOOL AND POPULAR EDUCATION, 



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^l^B. F. FOBTE 



'^ U.S.A. u 




S NEW-YORK: 
WILEY AND PUTNAM, 

161 BROADWAY. 

1837. 






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" EVERY SCHOOL THAT IS ESTABLISHED, EVERY CHILD THAT 
IS EDUCATED, AND EVERY SCHOOL-HOUSE THAT IS BQILT, ARE 
NEW AND ADDITIONAL PLEDGES FOR THE PERPETUATION, THE 
GROWTH, AND THE MORAL INFLUENCE OF YOUR INSTITUTIONS." 

Kentucky Report. 



ADVERTISEMENT. 



The following sheets are, iu reality, not so lauch a Review 
of Mr. Wyse's work on Education Reform, as an attempt to 
lay before the reader that part of it, which is more particu- 
larly applicable to Common Schools. The defects in practi- 
cal education which the author so feelingly deplores, are such 
as our own countrymen have not been slow to discover, and 
we believe that neither to Prussia, Germany, nor Switzer- 
land, will they yield the palm in the earnest search for more 
approved means of general instruction. The question has 
of late been kept alive in the Union, by various publications 
and addresses ; both the legislature and the community are 
anxious, as we believe, for the application of some improved 
system, and will therefore be likely to give grave attention to 
a work put forth by one who has attained a well-earned cele- 
brity for his exertions in the cause, and whose opinions are 
listened to with profound respect, by persons of every political 
temperament. 

The work from which this summary is extracted is com- 
prehensive in its views, but extended in its details ; it is, 
therefore, one to which public men would at this juncture be 
hardly disposed to give so large a share of consideration as 
every part deserves ; and it contains some matters also, which, 
however important in the abstract, are not so immediately 
pressing as others. Those observations, hovvever, which 
have reference to Popular Education and its concomitants, 
come home to the bosom of every man, in every grade of so- 
ciety, and are vitally connected with good order, both moral 
and political, and therefore can be neither too early nor too 
generally diffused. But in particular to legislatorial and 
other influential persons do they commend themselves, and 
therefore the portions directly relating to this subject, and 
which stand detached from each other in the original, are 
here collected, with little farther remark than was deemed 



ADYERTiSEMENT. 



sufficient to connect the passages, and take away from the 
otherwise abrupt effect in perusal. 

This pamphlet then is respectfully submitted to members 
of the state legislatures, and to the friends of Education gene- 
rally, in the earnest hope that it may lead to matured con- 
clusions on the subject, and produce public enactments for 
carrying into practical effect, such measures as may be per- 
manently beneficial to future generations. 

It cannot be denied, that a warm interest has been mani- 
fested, in every section of our common country, for the cause 
of education, and that zealous efforts have been made to pro- 
mote it I the great defect however seems to be, the want of a 
uniform mode of communicating instruction ; a mode which, 
under proper regulations, would make it a National Educa- 
tion in the strictest sense, by the inculcation of the same gene- 
ral principles, the same tones and manner of thinking and 
acting, yet consistent with that liberality of sentiment towards 
others, which is the distinguishing mark between education 
and ignorance, freedom and slavery, morality and licentious- 
ness — which, whilst it would render us more emphatically one 
people, would give us increased respectability in the eyes of 
the whole world, as well as in thosfe of each other. It is in 
Common Schools that the great body of the people is mainly 
interested. It is here that a reform is needed. Popular edu- 
cation can never be perfect, until it become a national con- 
cern. Hence, it is important that its advocates should aim, 
in all their preliminary measures, at the establishment of " a 
National System of Education ;" nor need there be any appre- 
hension, that this object is unattainable. Patient, persevering, 
•well-directed efforts must, ultimately, succeed in providing 
for every child in this favored country equal access to useful 
knowledge, equal inducements to virtuous conduct, and equal 
means of happiness. 

The aim of this publication is public good, however imper- 
fectly the writer may have endeavored to promote it ; and the 
highest emolument he looks for on the present occasion is, 
the gratification of seeing the adoption of the general views 
herein contained, or of such others as these may suggest. 

183 Broadway, New- York, B. F. P. 

December 2d, 1837, 



REVIEW. 



Education Reform ; or the Necessity of a National System of 
Education. By Thomas Wyse, Esq., M. P. Vol. I. d>vo. fp. 
553. London : Longrnaji <Sc Co. 1836. 

There is notbincr which more brilliantly characterizes 
the " march of intellect." than the impnlse it has given to 
the cause of popular education. The noblest characteristic 
of human nature is, that the reasonino-, and consequently 
the governing faculties we possess, are capable of cultivation 
and improvement to a degree, which, although indefinite in 
its extent, yet evidently so far as to give us vastly enlarged 
ideas both of mental and physical objects, and so as to con- 
fer on us the power of self-government in all things where 
reason is concerned. 

The gathering up of facts, the accumulation of abstract 
knowledge, the study of various lanouag'es, and the cultiva- 
tion of the sciences, are deservedly considered as estimable 
employments, and without an intimate acquaintance with 
some, and a general idea of all these matters, we do not 
usually account a person to be possessed of what is termed 
a liheral education ; yet, after ail, these are only to be sub- 
servient to higher and more important studies, to lead to a 
knowledge which it more concerns us to possess ; the know- 
ledge of ourselves — of our nature — of our position both in- 
dividually and relatively — of the benefits which we can and 
ought to reciprocate — of the best means of pron.oting the 
welfare, not only of the society of which we are respectively 

2 



6 Wyse on "Education Reform. 

members, but also of the whole community of mankind — 
and, lastly, of the duty and gratitude we owe to the Supreme 
Dispenser and Disposer — in short, to the knowledge of self- 
government all other acquirements are to be subordinate 
and conducive. 

In proportion as all these duties are understood and prac- 
tised among mankind, shall we fijid peace, good-will, social 
happiness, national prosperity, and all the attendant train of 
the arts, sciences, accomplishments, improvements, and every 
other accessory tending to elevate the human character, and 
capacitating, as well as inchning, responsible beings to do 
more honor lo their beneficent Creator. It is, therefore, the 
bounden duty of every government, and of all constituted 
authorities, to promote so great an end, and to encourage the 
heads of families, as well as single individuals, in giving all 
possible aid towards so important a desideratum. To abso- 
lute perfection no human institution can possibly arrive, but 
that should not prevent exertion to attain as high a position 
as the active intelligence of our natui'e can progressively 
I'each. And herein, perhaps, shall we best ascertain who has 
really attained to the most valuable possession of a good edu- 
cation, by their labors to disseminate the same kind of bless- 
ing lo the comn:unity in which they dwell. It is little that 
a man shall merely know what is good for mankind, and feel 
secure in his own powers to promote it ; it is the mere part 
of a miser — the most contemptible of characters— to lock up 
his intelligence within his own breast, regardless of the 
claims — yes, tlie claims — of his fellow-citizens to participate 
in those advantages, as far as they can reasonably be commu- 
nicated, according to the law of our nature, which makes us 
all mutually necessary to each other ; nay, he can be but im- 
perfectly impressed with that knowledge in the abstract, who 
does not perceive that every possessor of it is only an addi- 
tional channel for its communication. 

But if there be any in whom this dissemination of know- 
ledge is more especially incumbent — besides preachers and 
teachers, whose absolute profession it is, and of whom, there- 
fore, we need not here speak — it is to those who have leisure, 
together with attainments, and still more particularly to those 



Wyse on Education Reform. ' 7 

who take a part in the deliberative counsels of the nation, 
that we should look. Whatsoever n ay he the immediate < b- 
ject of legislation, whatsoever instant advantage is piopcsid, 
the conscientious and virtuous legislator will still keep con- 
stantly in view the great principles of enlarging the faculties 
and purifying the heart ; and whatever may be the secular 
emolument of a project, if it militate against either of these 
two points, he will dare to be its antagonist, and of pose its 
operation. 

It is with an honest pride that we cast our eyes ovjsr the 
labors of many among our own citizens in this philanthropic 
cause ; and the credit dne to them is not a little augmented 
by the consideration that those labors have been conjoint 
with others highly important, in the establi^ment, upon an 
imperishable basis, of our political position in relation to the 
world at large. Ours is yet but a young republic, although 
a vigorous and united one, and however pnre the springs 
from which our principles of legislation flow, it must be evi- 
dent that both care and skill are necessary in conducting its 
refreshing streams through the proper channels for dispens- 
ing happiness and freedom among all who partake its exhi- 
larating waters. Hence there is additional credit due to the 
many among us, who, in the busy times of the last sixty 
years, have been able to do so much for the promotion of 
popular education. But as the subject is of universal appli- 
cation, and concerns the well-being of all mankind, our plea- 
sure is only the more augmented when we tarn our attention 
to the lucubrations and labors of others. Among them the 
author of the work before us on " Education Reform," is 
deserving of a highly distinguished place. 

Blr. Wyse is precisely that description of person whom 
we have thought especially called upon to stand up in such 
cause, and we are bound to say that he has not " hid his 
talent in a napkin." Evidently of liberal education and 
enlarged views himself, he has had leisure also to mature his 
notions of practical utility, and has pressed, in the British 
Parliament, the importance of the subject as a national con- 
sideration. His zeal in the prosecution of the subject, honor- 
able both to his head and his heart, has been universally the 



8 - Wyse on Education Keforifi. 

theme of admiration and respect; but his labors were not 
coutined to senatorial endeavors. In the solitude of his 
closet he has composed the worli^upon which we purpose 
now to extend our remarks, and from which we shall have 
occasion to make copious extracts. In performing the latter . 
part of our vocation, however, we wish it to be understood, 
that it is only to give our readers a more lively sense of its 
general excellencies, and by no means to supersede the peru- 
sal of the book itself On the contrary, there is a minuteness- 
of detail in many parts of the general plan, there are so 
many occasional remarks, which, however valuable, cannot 
be separated from tlieir context, and so many minor, though 
useful suggestions, which could not well be brought into this 
summary view, that, after all, we must press upon the curious 
and the philanthropic to search into the work itself, if they 
wish to see a complete explication of the matter. Our article 
can but comprise the general outline and scope of this import- 
ant proposition, with sketches of the more prominent fea- 
tures, together with our own animadversions, as they float 
along the stream on which we proceed together with the 
author. 

The following extracts, which form a portion of the 
Introduction m Mr. Wyse's treatise, will put us in possession 
of his general views. They are liberal in the truest sense of 
the word, for they uphold the inherent dignity of our nature, 
and assert tlie duty of protecting that dignity by intellectual 
cultivation. We believe there are few of notions so despotic, 
or of dispositions so exclusive, that they will venture to offer 
a dissent to the propositions. They require no comment, but 
it might well be wished that sentiments thus delivered were 
imprinted in the bosom of our own legislators, that they might 
thereby be irresistibly impelled, at least to ponder upon them 
as important moral and political texts, and to take such steps 
as should result from a careful investigation of the matter. 

" Every man ought to be educated up to the level of the 
functions to which his country and situation call hiixi. One is 
preparation fur another ; and one mnn taught, soon becomes the 
teacher of twenty. Frcnn one centre, knowledge radiates in a 
thousand directions. The lower orders force their intelligence 



Wyse on 'Education Reform. 9 

upon the middle, and the middle upon the uppei*. The man 
who discharges one duty well, will equally well, with propor- 
tionate care and opportunities, discharge another. They will 
not only be good vestrymen, but good jurymen, good corpora- 

_ tors, good electors, and, if circumstances shall permit or re- 
quire, good representatives also. The duties are analogous ; 
they differ only in degree and extension. The middle orders 
will not less benefit by such improvement. Besides iheir own 
advance in the social scale, they will obtain a legitimate defence 
against the common encroachments of their superiors. Finally, 
their superiors will be subjected precisely to those restraints, 
which have been found, in all cases, the most favorable to the 
maintenance, not only of trne liberty, but of just power. They 
gain, in the general order, (the result of reflection and content,) 
the best guarantees for public tranquillity. Without such guar- 
antees, their pre-eminence is not better than any other, founded 
upon momentary partiality, or worn-out prejudice. It must, 
while it lasts, be exposed to the chances of every convulsion ; 
its excesses, though suffered, will not be the less avenged." 

" Education, it is true, will not of itself be sufficient : the 
people, when educated, must be surrounded with such circum- 
stances as may allow this education to work to good. Nothing 
can be more absurd and wicked than strengthening faculties 
which are not to be employed — exciting desires which are not 
to be gratified. It is out of the nature of things, that a People 
who read will not soon learn to think, and that a thinking Peo- 
ple w^ill not, sooner or later, learn to act. But Education, on 
the other hand, is not less necessary to give value to these cir- 
cumstances : it is to this interior world, to the enduring soul of 
man, that the legislator for millions and generations ought to 
look. If that be pure and sound, there is no fear of what may 
proceed from it." 

" To create this spirit — to make it what it ought to be — to 
make it national, is the highest end of the legislator and the 
educator ; — to succeed in such an end, their truest glory. With 

,such a spirit, so formed, all things are possible ; let it but once 
move over the wnters, and a world of order and beauty will 
soon rise out of the darkest confusion. Teach and habituate 
the People to make right use of the faculties which God has 
given them, and then trust them fearlessly to themselves. With 
such a guide within them, it little matters who may be over 



10 Wyse on Education Reform. 

tliem. Self-government, of all governments, becomes then the 
easiest and the best. The just bounds of Centralization, now 
so commonly confused, are at once determined. The People 
have their share of management with the Government, and the 
Government their share of burdens with the People. We 
complain of the proneness of the People, to the discussion of 
matters in which personally they can have little interest, and 
of which generally they know less : 

' Natio 



Trepiile concursans, occupata in otio, 

Gratis anhelans, multum agendo nihil agens.' 

" But the way to check or to direct this passion, is not restraint ; 
the People spurn it as they ought ; but the giving to an appe- 
tite — which is there for wise purposes, and cannot and ought 
not to be eradicated — its proper food. The People will not 
look abroad, at least not more than they ought to do, if they 
have interests to look to, and families and affections to cultivate, 
at home. The ignorance and neglect of this pl^in truth has 
been the cause of half the disturbances of the social machine 
in our own and other times. We complain of the facility with 
which the multitude fling themselves into the arms of the first 
intriguer who flatters or excites them. But we wrona; the Peo- 
ple : ive, not theij, are to blame. By refusing them education, 
we disqualify them from managing for themselves ; we render 
them childish by treating them as children : by blinding and 
degrading the People, we take from them the power and wish 
to choose well. What right, then, have we to vilify them if 
they choose ill % Bad government cannot exist for any time, in 
the face of good Education ; neither can popular folly or dis- 
order. Men who have knowledge and reflection, will soon have 
a steady and well-regulated will, and will not lightly surrender 
themselves to the random guidance of others. They will weigh 
and taste for themselves, and not require a weigh-master or 
taster to weigh and taste for them. Why did the American 
Revolution issue so differently from the French 1 Simply be- 
cause it was conducted under the auspices of knowledge and 
virtue. The men who wrought that mighty change, exhibited 
a good system alive in their own persons ; but then to work it 
as it ought to be worked, above all things, and before all things, 
the system must be good.",,' 



Wi/se on Education Reform. 11 

" In a reforming age, with the instruments of correction so nu- 
meiTjus and well adapted in our own hands, to stale an abuse 
ought, to be to correct it. But the disfosition is not sufficient' 
There must be due acquaintance with the means by which such 
correction may most easily, prudently, and certainly be effected. 
We must not ' simjdy repeal^ we must have some substitute — 
'precise and immediate — to present in its place." 

" Who, in the nineteenth century, will dare to avow himself the 
Apostle of darkness, a hater of the light — an enslaver of the 
minds and hearts of his future countrymen 1 Ministers can effect 
this change — li ihay will — will, they must, if they be, indeed, 
what they profess themselves to be, the People's Representatives 
ani^ the People's Government. Education Reform will be the 
crowning capital of the column of National Regeneration. It 
will be the seal to the bond ; the ward and keeper of all our 
happiness, of all our safety, of all our rights. Other measures 
may change, and yield, and be forgotten, as the national mind 
changes or subsides beneath them ; but this is a measure which 
creates the national mind — which insures, by its firm and broad 
substructions, the solidity and durability of every other structure. 
We raise up breakwaters against all vicissitudes, which would 
plunge us back again into ' the ancient night' from which we 
have yet but scarcely escaped, or precipitate us forward into 
extravagances which will risk the blessings we now enjoy. Un- 
til this shall be obtained, other reforms may be good, but they 
must also he provisional. The instruments we must use to work 
reforms, are not reformed themselves. Make the minds of men, 
you are masters of their actions — give them a right direction to 
a noble end, and you may safely trust all further progress, all 
ultimate improvement, to tJiemsclvesy 

" But the hoiv, is as important as the toJicn. Whilst yet unruf- 
fled by the rush of contending parties, the minister can sit down, 
and take in, not a faction, but a country, in his glance ; whilst he 
can legislate, not for this isthmus of life on which he stands, but 
for the continent of human existence beyond it; let him, in the 
name of country and religion, of all that is dear to man; patiently 
but fervently, but above all immediately, set him down to the 
task, A nobler never yet was confided to human intellect ; — to 
pour out blessings on any country, in any age, is worth the ambi- 
tion of the proudest ; but when that blessing is universal enli^ht- 
inent, nothing can be added in this life to the distinction ; the 



12 Wyse on Education Reform. 

full reward for the inestimable service can only be conferred in 
the next." 

" Civilized man has reflected, and inquired, but he has not yet 
been enabled to reduce Education to strictly fixed principles. 
The attempt has been made in Germany, and, under the desig- 
nation of Paedagogy, it has assumed the rank of a science. But 
a designation is not suificient to produce unanimity. Every dis- 
trict has its system ; every system has been blamed and praised 
in turn. The very bases of each have been successively attacked. 
AVhat diversity of opinion on the propriety of punishments and 
rew^ards — on authority and emulation — on severity of discipline, 
or the absence of discipline altogether ! The very first positions, 
in some instances, are scarcely yet determined. We know not 
yet, decidedly, how far the mitid, with its innumerable delicacies 
and intricacies, can be wielded, or disciplined by the body. We 
know not how far physical force and development correspond 
to moral ; or what are those faculties, or what are the laws of 
their affinity, which mutually strengthen or paralyze each other." 

" It is, unquestionably, a singular circumstance, that, of all pro- 
blems, the problem of Education is that, to which by far the 
smallest share of persevering and rigorous analysis, has yet been 
applied. The same empiricism, which once reigned supreme in 
the domains of chemistry, astronomy, and medicine, still retains 
possession, in many instances, of those of education. Our age 
is distinguished for its indefatigable attention to the most minute 
phenomena of the material world ; but the intellectual and moral 
are yet without their journalists. No journal is kept of the 
phenomena of infancy or childhood — no parent has yet registered, 
day after day, with the attention of an asti-onomer, who prepares 
his Ephemerides, the mHr^ellous developments of his child. 
Until this be done, there can be no solid base for reasoning ; we 
must still deal with conjecture. Until experience be more se- 
verely and constantly consulted, the Art of Education may appear 
to advance ; but we shall find that we only have changed place, 
and that Education itself has remained where it was." 

We greatly approve the three grand propositions which 
constitute the theory of Mr, Wyse's subject. In his preU- 
minary considerations he propounds the following | rinciples, 
viz. that Nat onal Education, to be effectively beneficial, 
should, in the first place, be good ; secondly: universal ; and, 



Wyse on Educatio'/i Reform. 13 

thirdly, should be provided with means for its permanent 
support. These three propositions become the heads of 
chapters, and he considers them in detail. 

In the first consideration, that " National Education should 
be good," he defines as follows : " The best system, of Edu- 
cation, is that whicJi enables each citizen most perfectly to 
fulfil the various duties which his several relations, public 
and private, in society impose upon him, by givi?ig to the 
physical, intellectual, and moral facilities, the full perfec- 
tion of which they are su,scept'ible." He then proceeds 
thus : 

" The best system of National Education, is that which best 
fulfils these several conditions. It should be such as, keep- 
ing steadily in view the perfection and duties of the individual, 
should fit him, by every possible development, for each. It 
should be such as should make him not only a good son, a good 
brother, husband, father, and friend, but also a good citizen. It 
should be an education fitting him for. the most skilful exercise 
of the particular trade, profession, or functions to which his 
position in society shall ultimately lead. It should be one 
which, by exciting a love of labor, an honorable emulation, a 
well-directed industry, should prepare him for the wise and 
rapid advancement of human civilization. But, above all, it 
should be a truly moral — a truly Christian education — not one 
of sect or of party ; not one of surface or of letter ; but an 
education, truly and thoroughly, of the spirit, and dealing with 
the spirits of men ; which, by striking at the root of all our 
vices, that systematic egotism, which leaves the individual with- 
out energy, as the state without vigor — that want of will which 
drags him at the wheel of every folly, of every seduction — that 
habit, in all things, of the little, the calculating, the material, 
should renew, elevate, and ennoble society in its very elements, 
and check at the root the vices of that civilization, which, with- 
out such check, it is sometimes a matter of doubt whether we 
should curse or bless. It should, in fine, be an education which 
should make the rising generation not only guardians of the 
rights and blessings which they are destined to enjoy, but refor- 
mers also of the corruptions which may still continue ; the mas- 
ters, and not the slaves, of their social prosperity; which should 
light in their hearts that moral flame, that generosity, that truth, 

3 



14 Wi/se on Education Reform. 

that ' loyaute,' for which there is so little aliment in our present 
system, but upon which, after all, the real power, as well as 
happiness, of nations is built. Whether such an education, 
with our actual means, and against our actual prejudices, be 
practicable, is another question. Our present methods give 
great surface, and little depth, to mind or character ; greater 
depth, and less surface, would be the result to which our educa- 
tion should be directed. But in order to obtain this, as well as 
other benefits, we have first to combat many monsters ; and of 
all, none more difficult to meet or vanquish, than our inordinate 
ignorance and vanity." 

" Good Education, being a preparation for social life, neces- 
sarily embraces the whole man — body, head, and heart ; for, in 
social life, the whole man is necessarily ' mis a contribution,* 
in one way or other, almost every hour. But this is not suffi- 
cient. There must be no preponderance, as well as no exclu- 
sion : a limited, or biased Education, produces monsters. Some 
are satisfied with the cultivation of a single faculty ; some, with 
the partial cultivation of each. A child is trained up to working ; 
he is hammered into a hardy laborer — a stout material for the 
physical bone and muscle of the state. This is good, so far as 
it goes ; but it is bad because it goes no farther. He is not 
taught reading — he is not taught religion — above all, he is not 
taught thinking. He never looks into his other self; he soon 
forgets its existence, ' vivit, et est vitse nescius ipse suae :' the 
man becomes all body — his intellectual and moral being lies 
fallow. The growth of such a system will be, a sturdy race of 
machines — delvers, and soldiers ; but not men : so much brute 
physical energy swinging loosely through society, at the discre- 
tion of those more spiritual natures, to whom their Education, 
neglected, or perverted in another way, gives wickedness with 
power, and teaches the secrets of mind, only as an instrument, 
to crush or play men for their own selfish purposes. 

" Others educate the intellectual and moral being only ; the 
physical, once the building is raised, like an idle scaffolding, is 
cast by. But the omission is injurious — ^often fatal : malady is 
laid up, in all its thousand, forms, in the infant and the child. It 
spreads out upon the man. When his spirit is in the flush of 
its strength, and his moral rivals his intellectual nature in com- 
pass and in power, then it is that this despised portion of his 
being rises up and avenges itself for this contempt. The stu- 



Wyse. on Education Reform. 15 

dious man feels, as he walks down life, a thousand minute retali- 
ations for this prodigal waste of his youthful vigor. The body 
bows down beneath the burden of the mind — it wears gradually 
away into weakness and incompetency ; clouds of sickness, 
pangs of pain, obscure, distort, weigh it to the earth. Health 
is not of organization only, but of training; it is to be laid up 
bit by bit. We are to be 77iade healthy — tutored and practised 
into health. Omit it in favor of the intellectual and moral facul- 
ties, and you provide instruments, it is true, for mind, but in- 
struments which, when wanted, cannot be used. Intellectual 
and Moral Education may rank before Physical, but they are 
not more essential : the physical powers are the hewers of 
wood and the drawers of water, for the spiritual. The base of 
the column is in the earth ; but without it, neither could the 
shaft stand firm above it, nor the capital ascend to the sky. 

" The education wlaich confines to the desk or chapel is par- 
tial ; it is only a chapter in the system. It is pernicious — it is a 
portion only of the blessing. If such be the result of separa- 
ting physical and intellectual education, how much more so of 
dividing intellectual and moral ! It is laboriously providing, for 
the community, dangers and crimes. It intrusts power, with 
the perfect certainty of its being abused. It brings into the 
very heart of our social existence the two hostile principles of 
Manicheism ; it sets up the glory and beauty of civilization, to 
be dashed to pieces by the ' evil spirit,' to whom it gives autho- 
rity over it. It disciplines the bad passions of our nature against 
the good, making men wicked by rule — rendering vice system^^^ 
intrusting to the clever head the strong hand, and setting both 
loose by the impulse of the bad heart below. The omission of 
Physical Education renders the other two ineffective or preca- 
rious ; but the neglect of Moral Education converts physical 
and intellectual into positive evils. The pestilence of a high- 
taught, but corrupt mind, ' blowing where it listeth' scathes and 
sears the souls of men— it is felt for miles and years almost in- 
terminable. By the press (the steam of the intellectual world) 
it touches distant ages and other hemispheres. It corrupts the 
species in mass. It is not only in the actual generation, but in 
the rickety offspring which follow late and long, that its deep- 
eating poison is strongly detected. Late ages wonder at the 
waste of great means, at the perversion of high opportunities, 
and noble powers, at the dereliction of solemn duties, which 
every where characterize these strong, but evil beings. Call 



16 Wj/se on Education Reform. 

them conquerors — call them philosophers — call them patriots^ 
put on what golden seeming you may — when the mask falls off, 
as it always does, in due season, Ave see behind it the woi'st com- 
bination which can disgust or afflict humanity. Such men — de- 
liverers and enlighteners (as their sycophants hail them) — such 
men are the true master-workers of the vices and calamities of 
their age and country. But who made them % They who taught 
them. Education left out its very essence. It gave them know- 
ledge, but it left them immorality. 

" But is Moral Education possible, without intellectual ] 
There are those who think they can, and ought to separate them. 
But they judge erroneously, and, thank God, attempt impossi- 
bilities. Half of our being cannot thus be torn from the other. 
They are intertwisted : it is difficult to say where one begins, 
and the other ends. The two great movers of our moral nature, 
are Sentiment and Reason. Sentiment is the aboriginal instinct 
of our being — that which, for a long period, preludes to, and 
supplies the place of. Reason, and, in its wonderful develop- 
ments of sympathy and imitation, directs more rapidly and truly 
to the degree of intellectual and moral culture for which it was 
intended, than even reason itself. It is the living flame, by 
which we measure the proportion of life which is within us. 
With Sentiment, all morality, all religion should commence. 
Hence, no child is too young for the first feelings of either. 
The Author of all good, and of all love, is already made known 
to the infant, in the smiles and caresses of its parents. But 
something more than this is required ; and Providence has been 
equally wise and beneficent in providing it. Reason is the 
regulator of this impulse, though not the impulse itself. Provi- 
dence offers us its aid, precisely at a period when it is demanded. 
Morality must confirm its impulses by its convictions. It must 
judge as well as feel. An act of sound judgment is often a 
virtue — if not a virtue, at least the creator of many. Most of 
the passions settle into vices, principally from the weakness or 
torpor of the intellect. A conscience, indeed, is set up ; but so 
completely under the guidance of its numerous assessors — pre- 
judices, illusions, fears, and other children of ignorance — that 
its decisions cannot for an instant be relied on. The decree of 
one day is reversed the next; it is dragged to and fro by con- 
tending beliefs and opinions ; it is the mere creatui'e of chance 
and impulse. How has all this vacillation and incoherence been 



Wyse on Education Reform. 17 

produced ? By the insufficiency, or the vagueness, of the mate- 
rials which go to make up its judgments. The senses have 
been uneducated — the perceptions uneducated ; the attention 
has been uneducated ; reason and judgment are therefore blind 
and random. The intellect, in a word, has lain dormant. Reli- 
gion — Piety is not the child of the affections only, but of the 
affections and of the reason combined. Allow the affections 
only to sway, without the regulation of reason, and this very 
Piety will soon become a spoiled child ! Where a false associa- 
tion sets in — where error is once engrafted by wrong judgment— 
every new step in the same line is a new error. The only re- 
medy is to go back, and to re-examine our judgments, and to 
bind them up again in a better form. Let a child be taught (or 
permitted) to connect with certain classes, or certain persua- 
sions, painful impressions — these classes and persuasions will 
often be the hobgoblins of his heart and head, for the remainder 
of his existence. He will confound them with the very nature 
of man ; and will, at last, associate the Divinity himself, with 
his hates and apprehensions. Extend this from one to many — 
from Individual to National Education — and you get at the root 
of all the unnatural intolerance, which not only divides nation 
from nation, but often societies, and even families from each 
other. In the case of the individual, these prejudices may pass 
off; there are generally various opportunities of correcting them. 
Approach, acquaintance, shows the absurdity of such opinions, 
and new habits and reciprocal services gradually dissipate them. 
But the case is very different with multitudes. The man who, 
in a private capacity, merely dislikes, or quietly plumes himself, 
like the Pharisee of old, * that he is not as one of these Publi- 
cans' — once engaged with others, in bodies, becomes, from the 
excitement and confidence which numbers usually create, a per- 
secutor, a pursuer, and, if he can, a tyrant. But is all this the 
true original man 1 Is this naked human nature 1 Is this inhe- 
rent malevolence — deep inwrought evil 1 No : it is only error 
grown into vice — a slow but certain growth — it is the pei'version, 
the insufficiency, the want of Intellectual Education. Intellec- 
tual Education teaches first to observe and inquire, and then to 
conclude. Just conclusions lead to just actions — just actions 
are virtue. A community, so formed, will not fall into those 
national prejudices, which not only strike with astonishment 
other times and nations, but, when the fit is over, surprise and 



18 Wi/se 071 Education Reform. 

humble themselves. The wise king asked for understanding, 
above all treasures. To him, it v\^as morality, virtue, religion. 
He was right — without it, morality is mere passion — virtue is 
an accident, or a name — religion gropes blindly into fanaticism, 
or floats off from disappointment into incredulity. A faith 
which is merely the echo of an echo— which is thought, but not 
believed, which is custom, but not conviction — rests passively, 
but not firmly, in the mind of the professor. It is not thrown 
off, neither is it kept. It remains there, if no storm threaten ; 
but the first blast which disturbs, destroys. No one would wil- 
lingly trust the character of a child to the decision of such 
chances ; much less the character of a community. How much 
wiser to build upon the base which God has given ; to build 
upon that which may sustain, and in the order in which the re- 
moval of no one stone may endanger the entire structure. That 
base is Intellectual Education. 

" When I speak of Moral Education, I imply religion ; and 
when I speak of religion, I speak of Christianity. It is morality, 
it is conscience, par excellence. Even in the most worldly sense, 
it could easily be shown, that no other morality so truly binds, 
no other education so effectually secures even the coarse and 
material interests of society. The economist himself would find 
his gain in such a system. Even if it did not exist, he should 
invent it. It works his most sanguine speculations of good, into 
far surer and more rapid conclusions, than any system he could 
attempt to set up in its place. No system of philosophy has 
better consulted the mechanism of society, or jointed it together 
with a closer adaptation of all its parts, than Christianity." 

We are thus diffuse in quoting from this valuable work, 
that we may the better exhibit both the benevolence and the 
universality of his plan. He is for arranging so that the body 
shall be exercised as well as the mind, and the moral princi- 
ples developed as well as those of the intellect ; and herein he 
shows the real meaning of the term Education ; which is 
not the mere acquisition of learning, the mere increase of 
knowledge ; but includes also the propagation of all the moral 
and mental influences which enable us to obey the laws of 
our Maker and of society, and the cultivation of that reason 
by which we can the more aptly understand the duties and 



Wyse on Education Reform. 19 

privileges of our present condition, together with the true 
means of attaining to final and eternal happiness. 

Mr. Wyse's book is so masterly in its details, and, to us at 
least, so just in its reasonings, that we shall offer no apology 
for continuing to extract largely, even at the hazard of its 
being said that we have made a summary, rather than a criti- 
cal examination of its contents. Yet our general admiration 
will not prevent us from animadverting freely, where the opi- 
nion of the author may come in collision with our own. 

We cannot but approve the system on which JMr. Wyse so 
strongly insists, of mingling bodily exercises in the duties of 
the day, with abstract studies. Each thus becomes a relief 
to the other, security is thus taken to preserve " mens sana 
in corpore sano^'' the attention to each is cheerful and vigo- 
rous, and in the application of the system to Common Schools 
and to children educated there, it is an admirable preparative 
to an active and industrious life,^ — a life which will be useful 
both to the individual and to the community. 

We do not quote the particular species of bodily exercise 
and labor which the author recommends for the various grades 
of schools, because these both can and must be accommodated 
to local circumstances, but the following passage is deserving 
of attention. 

" The teacher cannot be too much with his pupils, but espe- 
cially with their minds. He should extract Education from 
every thing. To the young, especially, every thing around is a 
book. This ambulatory instruction was justly preferred by the 
ancients to every other. It concentrates attention without 
labor ; it exercises the mind with the body ; it communicates 
knowledge through the medium of amusement. Geography, 
natural history, mathematics, especially lend themselves to this 
out-of-door illustration. The imagination also may be similarly 
cultivated. But religion more particularly derives from such 
exercises the most important assistance. It is sulHcient for a 
child to see the works of God, to love God ; to love God, is the 
best way to adore him. Children require xiol proofs, but emo- 
tions. Sentiment, even for a long period after the appearance 
of reason, is still their real guide — it is only when urged to it, 
that they appeal to reason. No emotion can be stronger than 



20 Wi/se on Education Reform. 

that which has its spring in religion, and is at the same time 
helped on by the keen sense of physical enjoyment. It binds 
up the most solemn and sacred influences for ever after with 
pleasure. Happiness, after all, is the best of all atmospheres 
for youthful education. Whatever checks, chills, or humbles, is 
directly adverse and injurious to their young and buoyant natures. 
It is a season of love, and hope, and exultation — and to load it 
so soon with the pains and fears of earth, is a gratuitous cru- 
elty — an error as well as crime. 

" A system of Physical Education, combined, of course, with 
minute attention to cleanliness and diet, not less important in 
National than Individual Education, and which, with air and 
warmth, have been but too much neglected, should be common, 
with such variations as circumstances may require, to every 
school in the country. The poor should not be deprived of its 
advantages; the rich should be induced to use them. Country 
schools, of every degree, from the simple parochial school up to 
the academy, oifer great facilities. They all should have their 
piece of ground, rooms for different trades, &c. &c. &c. In 
towns, this may be attended with more difficulty ; but schools 
in such situations, being affected by the peculiar disadvantages 
of their situation, ought to meet, in more than ordinary attention 
to these particulars, some antidote to the evil. Whenever they 
can be placed in suburbs or open spaces — wherever most air, 
most sky, most of the bright and green of nature, can be had — 
there, in mercy, not to the bodies only of the children, but to 
their minds, ought such institutions, at any expense, to be planted. 
Where this is not possible, compensation should be made for the 
want, by larger playrooms, and more airy workshops attached to 
the building. None of these circumstances are trivial. Our 
school associations cast their sunshine or gloom over many a long 
year of after-existence ; and in a season where so much of our 
spiritual nature depends upon mere material circumstances, as 
much life and joyousness should be thrown into them, as is pos- 
sible. It is a part of education to make these simple accessories 
pleasures, and not pains ; the first rudiments of feeling and 
knowledge, above all others, should be cleared from whatever 
can tend to obscure or distort them." 

There is one species of physical education to which our 
author alludes in a note ; it is one of universally admitted 



Wysc 071 Education Reform. 21 

influence ; yet, so far as we have perceived, is never enforced, 
save in practical business. It is that by which the senses are 
rendered more acute by their critical exercise. Thus the 
sight and hearing are more acute in the hunter, the touch in 
the pohsher, the smell, the taste, in persons whose judgment 
is to be guided by those senses. The improvement of those 
properties during the time of life appropriated to general edu- 
cation, may perhaps not be very great, but we can imagine it 
to consist with the general system to call them into action at 
every opportunity, and thus to sharpen them in a considerable 
degree. 

We cannot forbear inserting the next passage ; not so much 
for the observations contained in it, although they are per- 
fectly appropriate, but for the sake of the beautiful and 
striking note which is appended to it, and which we strongly 
commend to general reflection. 

" If it be true that the man is educated in the child; the man 
and child are educated in the infant. Every after-development 
is only a development. It is education transformed; the same 
quantity under a new name and expression, but at bottom, ' en 
derniere analyse,' the same. Yet, of all periods of education, 
this is the least considered as a period fitted for education — as 
if the child could, by any process, be kept in a sort of suspended 
existence — between knowledge and no knowledge, all this time. 
The child is educating, or miseducating ; it is moving, thinking, 
living. We can choose, indeed, whether it shall be educated 
well, or educated ill ; but we can no more put knowledge, or 
education of some kind or other, in abeyance, than we can life. 
But these truths are not believed, or not known — certainly very 
rarely felt. It is the chief obstacle to all elementary education. 
Hence, the first year is usually one constant struggle to remodel, 
rather than to advance the pupil. The foundation upon which 
an intelligent teacher tries to build, in the very moment of build- 
ing, gives way. Happy even if it occurs at such a period that 
he can build anew ; but the defect is often not discerned until 
discovery be too late. He ca,nnot put his pupils in relation with 
himself; he does not know by what means he can best correct 
them. The means are not in his hands ; the season has passed 
by. Until the mother be taught, (we cannot urge it too often, 

4 



22 Wi/se on Education Reform. 

or too earnestly,) the infant cannot be taught ; and until the 
infant be taught, the child will not be teachable* 

* " Who can educate a child, but a mother'? In perpetual change, it requires 
all the flexibility of the female character to follow and catch the infinite varie- 
ties through which it passes. Any other eye becomes giddy in attempting it. 
"What but the female imagination — its vivacity — its disinterestedness — passing 
into another being, and still preserving all the peculiarities of its own — can 
fully comprehend them. The child is fresh and frank — hates constraint and 
hypocrisy — lives on sympathy — is all love. Who can think with it, and 
almost in it — who can understand it, through the heart, that best of interpre- 
ters — who can satisfy the first want of its young nature — like a mother 1 But 
mothers are not always inspired, even by nature. They require reflection, as well 
as instinct ; method as well as affection. How many children are taught caprice 
by kindness — weakness by indecision ! Rousseau leaves all to nature; but 
parents cannot thus abdicate their trust ; they must not be left to nature as well 
as their children. Where firmness is not, there will be no protection — where 
love is not, protection will not consult the happiness of the child. What yields, 
cannot support ; a child requires both love and support. If the mother appears 
like another child^ — if she partakes all vacillations of her offspring, how should 
it respect her — what reason should it have to believe her its mother 1 But firm- 
ness should not degenerate into severity, nor anxiety into ill-temper. A child 
is much more prone to imitation than to fear. He lives in you, feels in you ; 
what he finds in you, he reproduces in himself. Hence nothing is indifferent. 
Looks and words fall on these young natures with the same force as actions do 
on that of others. They creep into their imaginations; they settle there, and 
form, for years after, part of their recollections, and, very generally too, of their 
characters. This is a fact of infinite importance; it is the key of all early 
education. Feed your child with sounds and sights of sincerity and fondness ; 
breathe about him an atmosphere of serenity — ' ce calme mele de joie' — his 
natural element; love him well, and love him wisely, and you may dispose of 
him in all things even as you will. But who can do this like a mother 1 and 
what mother so well as she who feels and studies it for herself 7 Such mothers, 
it is hoped, may yet be numerous, though neither fashionables, nor managers, 
nor blue-stockings ; but mothers in the high and holy sense of the name — 
deeply penetrated with their sacred calling, and pursuing it ' in singleness and 
in simplicity — with energy and with intelligence — with assiduity, but without 
fidget — with dignity, but without parade.' It is this domestic, this fireside 
Ediication — this Education oHndh and love — which has given the greater por- 
tion of its value to Scotch Education ; which transmits the talent and virtue of 
the mother to the son, and receives in return from the son the tribute of his ear- 
liest and most durable affection. Not to the father — not to the wife — not to the 
child— but to the aged mother, the emigrant sends back the first-fruit of his dis- 
tant exertions. So true it is what Pestalozzi says — ' There are no better teach- 
ers than the house, and the father's and mother's love, and the daily labor at 
home, and all the wants and necessities of life.' It is this domestic Education, 
which, of all others, is most wanting in all classes under our present system. 
Without \i public Education may be good in an intellectual -pomt of view; 
(though even that is difiicult ;) in a moral it must be defective, if not worse. 



Wi/se on Education Reform. 23 

Mr. Wyse devotes several pages to that part of Intellectual 
Education which he terms cBsthetics, or the education of 
attention ; and he is strongly opposed to that mere verbal 
education by which words only are learned without any in- 
crease of knowledge to the understanding. In this respect 
he perfectly coincides with Miss Edgeworth ; and, indeed, 
every one must be aware how rapidly the education of the 
young proceeds when once their curiosity is fully awakened, 
and they find at each step that they have acquired some new 
idea. 

But this part of the subject relates only to the principles 
of Intellectual Education ; he next proceeds to the appli- 
cations. 

" There are two considerations involved in these applications : 
1, The ^«oz^ZeJg-e communicated ; 2. The mode of communica- 
ting it : or, 1. Studies ; and, 2. Instruction. Studies depend upon 
the wants of the individual. See what is likely to be of use, 
and prepare for that. ' Much of the time that is spent in teach- 
ing boys to walk upon stilts,' says Miss Edgeworth, ' might be 
more advantageously employed in teaching them to walk well 
without them.' Studies may thus be divided into such as are 
necessary to all, and such as are necessary only to some ; or 
into, 1. Essential; 2. Accessory. 

" Essential studies are, Reading, Writing, Mother Tongue, 
Mathematics, Useful Knowledge, &c. &c. 

" Accessory studies are. Natural History, Geography, History, 
Physics, Astronomy, &c. 

" Reading. — It is still a matter of much discussion at what 
period reading should be taught. The partizans of memory 
would begin at once ; the partizans of reason would wait. This 
depends upon their manner of considering the subject. The 
former think of words, the latter of things. Reading is the 
study of both. 

" In reading, there are three processes : — 1. Formation of 
sounds, or pronunciation, ii. Connecting these sounds with a 

The tendency of modern institutions — fond of masses, and co-operation, and 
broad effects, and sudden display — is to weaken and limit these home-bred in- 
fluences. Proportionally greater ought to be our anxiety to extend and 
strengthen them. 



24 Wyse on Education Reform. 

letter or letters, or alphabetic teaching, and spelling. 3. Com- 
bining these letters into words and sentences, or eading. 

" Great diversity of opinion exists among Educationists, which 
of these three processes should be taken first. Some begin with 
pronunciation, and then proceed to the other two, as Pestalozzi ; 
others with the alphabet and spelling, our ordinary method ; 
others, again, with reading, as Mr. Wood. 

" But proper arrangement is not the principal difficulty. The 
pronunciation of the letters, when single, bears little resemblance 
to their pronunciation, when combined ; the pronunciation at one 
time, is not the same as at another, either of letters, syllables, or 
words ; the spelling is often a most incorrect decomposition of 
the word, analyzing neither its meaning, nor its formation ; the 
reading is committed, in general, to chance, without the least 
reference to the new character which every word necessarily 
assumes, the moment it is combined with others. All this re- 
quires correction. 

" It seems quite preposterous to use signs for sounds, before we 
first possess the sounds for which the signs are to be used. It 
is unnatural ; it is injurious. A child who is sat down to an alpha- 
bet and spelling, before he is habituated to, at least, the simple 
sounds which arise from either, will necessarily be embarrassed 
by both ; and not only will not proceed faster, but will proceed 
much more incorrectly and painfully, than a child who is fami- 
liarized first with the sounds, before he advances to the letters. 
Pestalozzi, therefore, seems to have judged accurately, in com- 
mencing with pronunciation. 

" ' Pronunciation' and accent cannot be taught too early, too 
assiduously, too perseveringly. Without going to the full length 
of the assertion, that no man e^er pronounced confusedly, whose 
ideas were not also confused, it cannot be denied that the influ- 
ence of a clear, sharp-struck, rhythmical pronunciation has 
scarcely more influence on the hearer, than on the speaker. In 
all periods it has been the characteristic of intellectual nations, 
and almost in proportion to their intellectual superiority. 

" It is a more difficult question, to settle the priority or pre- 
cedency between spelling and reading. It is clear, however, 
that both must be preceded by an accurate knowledge of the 
alphabet. 

" ' Alphabetic teaching,' as it is generally practised, is the dis- 
grace of elementary education. It is a complication of useless 
and difficult absurdities. 



Wyse on Education 'Reform. 25 

" These may be reduced to — 1. the naming of the letters ; 2. 
their classification ; 3. the determination of their powers. 

" The names of the letters are,, with the exception of the vow- 
els, at variance with their sounds. In languages where vowels are 
not used, and consonants, therefore, very indeterminate, it would 
perhaps, be a matter of difficulty to designate them by any name, 
strictly expressive of their sound : the same difficulty ought not 
to exist with us. In teaching them to the child, we should give 
them a name, as nearly as possible coinciding with this sound ; 
their ordinary names may be learned afterwards. 

The classijicatioii. of the letters seems the work of mere chance. 
No possible reason, theoretic or practical, worth attending to, 
can be given for the order in which they now stand. It is com- 
mon, or nearly so, to most languages ; but the consonant lan- 
guages ought surely not to have been the model for ours. 
They are arranged, neither in accord with their sound or appear- 
ance. So far are they from assisting, they unnecessarily em- 
barrass the pupil. 

" The alphabet should be classified, as well as named, anew. 
The classification might proceed on the principle of the resem- 
blance to each other, either of the letters or of the sounds. For 
reading, I should prefer the latter ; for writing, the former. The 
latter is much more difficult. The vowels give their sound to 
the consonants ; and thus five classes might be determined, un- 
der which all the consonants might be ranged. But this would 
be of very limited service ; it would not be, properly speaking, 
a classification of the alphabet. The name of the isolated con- 
sonant would remain undetermined. There is nothing, however, 
which prevents both from being tried. When we once depart 
from the classification in use, and adopt a new one, it is imma- 
terial whether there be one, two, or three classifications. 

" The powers of the letters, in English at least, are very capri- 
cious ; but they may be reduced to some sort of system, by 
either classifying them under the more marked sounds of the 
vowels, to which they are, by the preceding arrangement, an- 
nexed, or else (a more complicated process) by determining cer- 
tain original sounds, under which they may be respectively 
arranged. 

" As * alphabetic teaching' precedes * spelling,' so ' spelling,' 
it would appear, ought to precede ' reading.' But two very 
different meanings may be attached to this. Our present system 



26 Wyse on Education Reform. 

teaches spelling by long columns of monosyllables, dissyllables, 
trisyllables, arranged according to similarity of sound, but with- 
out meaning or connection. The one here intended selects such 
as resemble in sound, but still bear a signification, and practises 
tbe pupil, progressively, on these, and on these only." 

" When the pupil has made sufficient progress in these preli- 
minary studies, he should proceed to ' Reading.' The chief 
points to be kept in view in reading, are, I. Gradual progres- 
sion ; and, 2. Utility. Unless a child understands what he 
reads, it is quite obvious that his understanding cannot benefit ; 
but it is not quite so clear that his memory must suffer also, that 
even the mechanical part of reading, cannot be carried on as it 
ought. If he does not understand, he must read at random, 
with inattention ; he must read ill. If idle, he will never un- 
derstand ; and contract, besides, the ruinous habit of listlessness 
and inaccuracy in future; if diligent, he will try to understand, 
and generally fail. Whilst attempting to discover a meaning, 
he should be listening to pronunciation, &c., or engaged in pro- 
nouncing himself In attempting to do both, he will do neither 
well. But then, in justice to the child, the book should be com- 
prehensible, and the master competent. Both text and explana- 
tion should be adapted to his years and intelligence ; in other 
words, should be accurately graduated ; not only nothing left 
unexplained, but nothing introduced which was difficult of ex- 
planation. Nor will this be sufficient ; the lesson should not 
only be clear, but of service. The pupil should learn words as 
well as sounds, and things as well as words. But I am antici- 
pating : the moment a pupil begins to read, he should imme- 
diately begin the study of his * Mother tongue.' In treating of 
the manner in which that important branch should be taught, an 
opportunity will offer of more fully showing how all the above 
principles should be applied. 

" Writing. — The principles of reading are rendered more 
practical by writing ; and it combines, besides, the application 
of the principles of drawing, at least in a slight degree, and the 
first hints of geometry. It is a new lesson m forms. 

" The generation of the letters should be the leading princi- 
ple, the first point attended to ; the recomposition, or formation, 
follows easily. 

•' It is only by gradual, but not necessarily slow steps that the 
pupil should proceed to these different stages. In writing, as in 
every other branch of Education, he should not be permitted to 



Wyse on Education Reform. 27 

advance to a new lesson, or a new order of ideas, until he be 
completely master of the old. 

" Writing, as well as reading, should be applied to purposes 
of intellectual and moral instruction. 

" Attention should be paid to the physical management of 
this department, the position of the pupil, the substances used, 
&c. &c. They materially influence, not only writing, but com- 
position, the mind as well as the hand ; and what is more import- 
ant than either, at this age, the health. 

•' Mother tongue. — Knowledge is not to be acquired by accident, 
at least to any great amount, or with any great rapidity. We 
may ultimately, indeed, without the assistance of masters, or 
methods, reach our destination by a circuitous route of our own j 
but this, as Reid says, is like going round by Paris to reach 
London. Almost every thing in Education requires to be 
taught : the inspirations of natural genius are not to be listened 
to. But when we say taught, it is meant not only that the 
teacher should teach, but, what is far more difficult, should 
enable the pupil to teach himself. 

" This maxim, true in all cases, is especially true in teaching 
the ' mother tongue.' We may speak prose all our life, like 
the Bourgeois Gentilhomme, without our knowing it; but it is a 
different thing to speak it well. 

" But we learn a language not merely for the purpose of 
speaking it well, but also as an instrument of mental culture. 

" Both these objects should be pursued simultaneously. It 
will be necessary, however, for the sake of clearness to con- 
sider them successively ; and first in reference to the acquisi- 
tion of the language. 

"All languages are analytic methods; and in proportion to 
the greater or less degree of analysis visible throughout, is the 
more or less perfection of the language. This, particularly 
striking in the operations of reasoning, is also very perceptible 
in those of imagination. 

" A language, like every other branch of knowledge, is best 
learned by studying it, in the way in which it was formed. To 
know any thing, we must know how it is composed ; to know 
how it is composed, we must decompose it. 

" These two considerations point out at once to us the course, 
which should be adopted in teaching language. The method 
being analytic, we should pursue this analysis ; but in order to 



28 Wyse on Education Reform. 

pursue it with effect, we should resolve the language into its 
simplest elements." 

Grammar and Syntax are a collection of laws or rules. 
Rules are gathered from practice ; they are the result of in- 
duction, to which we come by long observation and comparison 
of facts. It is, in fine, the science, the philosophy of language. 
In following the process of nature, neither individuals nor na- 
tions ever arrive at the science first. A language is spoken, and 
poetry written, many years before either a grammar or prosody 
is even thought of. Men did not wait till Aristotle had con- 
structed his Logic, to reason ; they were eloquent before either 
he or Cicero had prescribed their code of eloquence. All these 
are only abbreviated methods, grammars, to come at the same 
end — to enable us to do always more surely, what is sometimes 
done, but not so surely, without their aid. To learn Grammar 
and Syntax, then, in the end, instead of the beginning, is follow- 
ing precisely the course of nature ; it is learning the language 
analytically ; learning it, in fine, in the very way in which the 
language itself has been formed. Language is a science and an 
art : a science in the sense just mentioned ; in its application to 
composition and speaking — in its becoming practical, an art. 
We begin with the art first, but without the science also, we 
can seldom apply the art well. Yet, as matters now stand, with 
all our affectation of grammar-learning, we practise the art ill, 
reach the science late, and sometimes never reach it at all. 

" The arrangement proposed is not only the most natural and 
judicious, but it may well be supposed the easiest. A child 
hardly requires either grammar or syntax earlier. When he 
does require it, it is ready for him ; he finds it almost of him- 
self. The fact is, in the course already given, he has been im- 
perceptibly forming his own Grammar and Syntax all along. 
When he comes to them in the end, he merely rediscovers ; he 
merely finds a somewhat shorter, and more formal method of 
going through the same process, to which he had been already 
accustomed. 

" With such preliminary studies, accuracy and propriety of 
language will soon become easy. Provincialisms, which, though 
the basis of all national language, still detract considerably from 
their power as instruments of communication and knowledge, 
if they cannot at once be proscribed, may yet be made gradually 
to disappear. A tone of civilization will spread to the lowest 



TVyse on Education Reform. 2'9 

cottage, a move obvious connection of the different orders will 
ensue. Above all, increased facilities will be obtained for the 
cultivation of the intellectual and moral powers. This is the 
second object to be considered in teaching the mother tongue. 

" In applying the study of language to the development of 
the intellect and the conscience, we proceed on precisely the same 
principles, as in learning the language itself. We reduce the 
phrase to its simplest elements — we then advance to the more 
complex. We begin by assuring ourselves of the clearness and 
accuracy of our ideas ; we then proceed to combine them. 

" It is a matter of infinite importance to acquire this distinct- 
ness at an early period. The idea should be kept dear and p?-e- 
cise. The ivord should be kept steady io the idea. These are 
the two great rules. 

" The first is acquired by analysis, by examining the object in 
its several parts, and then recomposing it anew. Long before 
a child begins to read, he should have been thus exercised, on 
a variety of objects, from the simple to the complex, from the 
cornmon to the rare. He should from thence be led, by a series 
of observations, to discover an uniform method for such obser- 
vations ; he should be taught to classify their results under con- 
venient heads ; he should be shown, by practice and experience, 
the utility of such methods and classifications, both in facilita- 
ting the acquisition of knowledge, and the communication of 
knowledge to others. With these habits he is prepared for the 
formation and application of his vocabulary, 

" He now begins to deal with words, and the second rule be- 
comes necessary. No word should be admitted of which the 
signification was not first accurately analyzed and strictly defined. 
No quarter should be given to half meanings, and presumed 
meanings ; far better for the pupil to own that he had no mean- 
ing at all. But neither should a signification be given by the 
master, not ^mW^ felt by the pupil himself, and in perfect accord 
with the actual state of his mental progress. It is not necessary 
that it should be complete, but it is quite necessary that it 
should he just ; above all, it is essentially necessary that it should 
be understood. In this, as in every thing else, we should en- 
courage his curiosity — his sacred thirst of knowledge ; but it 
should rather be by showing him the road to the waters, than by 
bringing the waters to him. He should taste the sweets of 
labor and the joys of discovery ; for we should always remem- 

5 



30 Wi/se 071 Education Reform. 

ber that it is not so much knowledge he has to acquire, as the 
means to acquire and usefully to apply knowledge. Not only 
should he give the signification of every word, but also the rea- 
son for preferring one signification to another; the mode by 
which he arrived at that result ; in fine, every other circum- 
stance connected, during the process, with the operations of his 
own mind. Nor should the teacher be satisfied with simple 
assent. He should probe, and get to the bottom of his know- 
ledge, before he allowed him to go on. This practice of ' ac- 
counting' to the teacher will soon produce, in addition to the 
other exercises, the most valuable intellectual habits — exact in- 
quiry, strict examination, methodical memory, and not only a 
knowledge of the operations, but a power also in the regulation 
of his mind. 

" Moral lessons naturally arise out of the words selected for 
his vocabulary. There is scarcely one which may not form the 
text for a highly useful moral discussion, adapted, like the 
intellectual exercise, to the mind and progress of the pupil, and 
the circumstances in which he is actually placed. I say 
discussion, and not lecture ; for the pupil should always feel that 
he is active and not passive — that he bears, and is entitled to 
bear, his part. 

" In the second stage, a larger field is opened. The form- 
ation of sentences naturally leads to the formation of propositions. 
These are formal exercises of the reasoning power—the first 
rudiments of logic. These propositions should be, at first, 
simple, self-evident, and absolute ; exercises of little difficulty, 
but of great use in showing the process itself, of reasoning. 
They should gradually become complicated, doubtful, and 
conditional. The subject matter should not be indifferent, but 
should have a direct reference to some useful practical informa- 
tion, domestic or public economics, or some important moral 
truth. At first, the pupil may simply analyze and discuss these 
propositions ; but by degrees he should be required to construct 
similar propositions himself; and not only to construct them, 
but to render an account of the principle and grounds of 
their construction, in the same maimer as he did of the significa- 
tion and connection of words. 

"The third stage — grammar, syntax, and the composition of 
essays and discourses — affords every opportunity for the com- 
bination and extension of all these exercises. Minute analytical 



Wyse on Education Reform. 31 

descriptions— long trains of argument, — disquisitions connect- 
ed with private and public duties, the combination of their 
several conditions, may naturally follow. The pupil is now 
fully qualified for the exercise of his intellectual and moral fa- 
culties, on all these subjects. But in this, as in every preceding 
step, self-examination should always be insisted on — the ac- 
counting process should never be dispensed with. It is not 
enough that the pupil should succeed in explaining a difficulty, 
or surmounting an obstacle ; he should have made himself 
master of the means by which similar victories may be achieved 
in future. 

" This course, as well as that of language, should be accom- 
panied throughout, by such a series of class reading, as may 
not only be graduated, but in perfect harmony with the spirit of 
the system. A class book for each branch, and for each stage, 
would be essential. They might be made, if written in the 
proper tone, and with due acquaintance with the objects in 
view, the vehicle of the most interesting and important infor- 
mation." 

Here let us pause, and look back for a moment. It must 
be evident to every reflecting observer, that the present mode 
of teaching children to spell is ftiulty in the extreme. Nine 
times in ten the sounds of the several letters in a w^ord will 
convey no notion whatevei:, in their combination, of the 
word itself; and, in fact, spelling, according to the present 
system, is little more than a collection of arbitrary facts, laid 
up in the memory of the young, indeed, for continued use, 
but in which they perceive no principle or general rule for 
their guidance, and consequently it is mere gleaning, and a 
most galling labor. 

There appears to be much force in the suggestion that 
children should learn to read short words before they study 
the alphabet. It is the true system of analysis ; it is fotmded 
on the progress of nature herself, a deviation from whose 
laws is always of problematical wisdom at least. What a 
lapse oi invaluable time is frequently passed over in the labo- 
rious attempt to teach a child to distinguish by name twenty- 
six marks or characters, which have not the slightest interest 
to him, and which, even when known, he cannot apply to 
any beneficial purpose ! For instance, by what process of 



32 Wyse on Education Reform. 

reasoning can he arrive at the conckision that the four letters 
pronounced doubleyou, aitch, ay^ tee., should, when put 
together in combination, form the word tvhat 7 

We agree with Mr. Wyse in the propriety and advantage 
of setting children early to write. It has a two-fold benefit. 
Children become familiar with the forms of the letters, which 
aids their recollections in the use of them, and they thereby 
also begin to exercise the eye and the judgment in imitation 
or drawing. This practice, therefore, assists both intellectual 
and physical education. But there is one defect, a physical 
one, in this department of practical education, that is too 
frequent, and cannot too soon, or too effectually be supplied. 
We allude to the general inattention of teachers to the posi- 
tion in which the pupils sit to write, and which is sometimes 
productive of injurious consequences to the chest, of obliquity 
of vision, and is even hurtful to the sight. This ensues from 
the sprawling position in which they are often allowed to go 
through the writing exercise, and besides the tendency to 
injure the health and sight, is extremely detrimental to the 
judgment in the imitative process. We might even go farther, 
and protest against the custom of putting pupils to the 
exercise of writing on a small scale, before they have learned 
the principles and elements of letters upon a larger. It 
lays the foundation of a cramped hand, insufficient in every 
respect to the purposes of the counting-house, and to com- 
mercial matters generally. We may the more strongly urge 
this, although it is but a secondary thing in the general plan 
of education, because ours is emphatically a commercial 
country, and therefore every thing connected with commer- 
cial affairs is deserving of being placed upon its proper foot- 
ing, and of being taught in the most effective manner. 

Our author next considers the subjects of arithmetic, geo- 
metry, and algebra, which he includes in one branch, and 
which he would have studied nearly simultaneously. He 
prescribes the course to be pursued in considerable detail; but 
as many would consider both his theory and his practice 
somewhat visionary — ourselves among the rest — we refrain 
from quoting the text. Doubtless there may be better modes 
found out for the promotion of these important studies than 



Wyse on Education Reform. 33 

most of those which now exist ; the practical teacher, how- 
ever, can accommodate himself to experience and local cir- 
cumstances in the matter. But the latter two in the category- 
seem to require so much more power of reflection than the 
elements of the first, that we cannot help being persuaded 
of the advantage of permitting the youthful mind to be- 
come familiar with the ordinary operations of arithmetic, 
and let it thereby expand until it can embrace the leading 
doctrines of the others. This may be done, we conceive, 
without any unnecessary delay, or final loss in attaining to 
the due knowledge of the latter. 

We next proceed to the consideration of the " Useful 
Knowledge" proper to be disseminated through the medium 
of elementary schools. 

" Useful Knowledge. — It comprises tlie elements of drawing, 
geography, history ; general notions, in the most popular form 
on the nature and operations of mind ; preliminary principles 
of logic ; outlines of natural law ; the particular law of the 
country; sketches of national biography; elementary principles 
of medicine, adapted to the people ; principles of domestic 
education; of household, agricultural, commercial industry, &c., 
&c. The extreme advantage of these portions of public in- 
struction in elementary schools is obvious. If the pupil is per- 
mitted by circumstances to proceed farther, they lay a firm and 
large foundation : if not, they foi'm a good stock of education 
by themselves. To those, therefore, whose means and time are 
limited, such as the lower classes, they are inestimable. The 
greater part of our national follies and frenzies arise from the 
want of good moral education in the first instance, and in the 
next from the sheer ignorance of large bodies of the people, of 
the principles upon which their own interests, and those of 
society, repose. Even the half knowledge on these points which 
some have acquired, is, perhaps, worse than no knowledge at all. 
The people must be instructed, in order to check the people. 
False knowledge must be put down by true — twilight by broad 
day. Until something of this kind be first done, the rest of our 
Education will be a pernicious waste of time and means. It- 
will give us pedant and superficial talkers on freedom and mo- 
rality, instead of making us either moral or free. 



34 Wyse on Education Reform. 

" A certain portion then, of these elements, may, according to 
circumstances, with little expenditm^e of time or laboi", be com- 
bined with popular instruction in every school, however ele- 
mentary, in the country. In their farther developments they 
constitute those accessory studies necessary in the higher branch- 
es of elementary Education. 

" Drawing. — I begin with Drawing, because, if it is to be 
learned, it cannot be learned too soon ; and because I feel the 
immense assistance it gives the pupil, in the prosecution of the 
several studies, which are to succeed. It is, besides, an almost 
necessary concomitant to Geometry; the applications of the sci- 
ence can scarcely be practised without it. 

"Drawing embraces two departments — the rational, if I may 
so call it, and the Eesthetic. The first is chiefly imitation ; the 
other is the moral, or philosophy of this imitation. 

"Whatever may be thought of the applicability of the last to 
general, much less to elementary schools, the first is obviously 
useful, not only in the prosecution of actual studies, but in fitting 
pupils more perfectly, for numerous situations hereafter. A 
Common peasant will often have occasion to recollect a particular 
construction, either of house, instrument, the appearance of a 
plant, &c. The artizan, the mechanic, absolutely requires it. 
A stroke of a pencil is often worth, in accuracy, to say nothing 
of the economy 6f time and labor, a thousand written words. 

" Drawing, as a mechanical art, grows out of measurement ; 
but measurement, affected by position, by appearance of light and 
shade, and, finally, by both associated with color. This divides 
it into three branches : — Outline and Perspective ; 2. Light and 
Shade ; 3. Color. 

" The elements of Architecture may be made a very pleasing 
and useful accompaniment to drawing. Though its higher de- 
velopments are necessarily aesthetic, its elementary portions are 
connected with the elements of measuring and drawing. In 
teaching it, the same process is to be followed — the road of in- 
vention : in no instance is it more obviously the road of instruc- 
tion. The pupil begins, as usual, with facts ; he sets out building 
in paper, pasteboard, wood, for himself: — the first rude essays 
of mankind are then brought under his notice, and he is gra- 
dually led on, as in drawing, &c., to discover (the particular cir- 
cumstances of the case being given) the successive improvements, 
from the first rudiments in the tent, cavern, or cottage, to the 



Wyse Oil Education Reform. 35 

final development of the art in the architecture of Greece and 
Rome. The whole of the course is to be carried on, as in pre- 
ceding instances, by realities — that is, not by dry measurements 
on paper, with complicated rules, but by exemplifications in 
models or real buildings. It should not be a course of terms, 
but of things ; — the spirit of the art, and not its mechanism ; — the 
development, in fine, of the human faculties, and not the patch- 
ing together a few scraps of pedantry. A hand and eye accus- 
tomed to geometry and drawing, will easily transfer all this to 
paper; — it will be an extension only of its applications." 

" Natural History. — The same process. Zoology is the most 
attractive to a child ; but there is this objection to it, — it cannot 
be exemplified, except in a very limited way, upon real objects. 
Yet, &n the whole, it is better to begin with it, than with Botany, 
or Mineralogy. It should, in all its departments, however, be 
as much as possible studied from nature itself, and not from 
copies : where this is impracticable, the copies should be, as 
nearly as possible, taken from nature, and in strict resemblance. 
Stuffed specimens are obviously preferable to engravings, and 
colored to uncolored. The child should begin, too, with the ani- 
mals within his actual observation, instead of at once setting out, 
as is usually the case, with lions, elephants, &c. A dog, a sheep, 
an ass, seen and compared every day, will be a better lesson for 
his faculties, and a better preparation for future inquirie's and 
discoveries, than all the monsters of the African deserts. We 
do not make sufficient allowance for the vagueness of these de- 
scriptions ; — to the mind of a child they present much the same 
sort of idea that is presented to us, by the description of Scylla 
or Chai'ybdis, aChimsera, &c. We should not forget the nature 
of a child's imagination — how little limited by experience — how 
eager for the excitement of the marvellous — how incapable of 
distinguishing between the extraordinary, and the extravagant." 

" Geography. — Though the higher departments of this im- 
portant branch of knowledge should necessarily be preceded by 
some progress in the preceding studies, especially geometry, 
drawing, and natural history, its elements may be taught, as we 
have already observed, even before reading, or at least before 
the study of the mother tongue. Its rudiments are already 
learned in the daily walk. A child sees all the definitions which 
load our geographical catechisms and grammars, far better in 
the open page of natui'e, than in books. Having fully mastered 



36 Wi/se on Educatio7i Reform. 

these preliminary elements of Mathematical Geography, he may 
proceed to the second branch of the study, or, 

" 2. Constructive Geography. — This leads, of course, to the 
more enlarged study of Physical Geography. 

" 3. Physical Geography. — When sufficient proficiency is 
attained in all the foregoing branches, the pupil may proceed to 
an examination of the animal, vegetable, and mineral productions 
of each great division. Climate, whether determined by latitude 
or longitude, or by the height above the sea, will here introduce 
new classifications. 

" 4. The pupil may now advance to what I should term Histo- 
rical Geography, or, more specifically, the progress of historical 
discovery. This, which may accompany history, and form a 
course of ancient well as modern Geography, will distinctly 
explain the natm^e of national and social boundaries, political 
aggregations, &c. 

" 5. In concurrence, thex'efore, with this last branch may be 
studied Political and Statistical Geography. It should not be con- 
fined to a mere distribution of countries into their actual civil 
divisions, but should embrace all the most material circumstances 
connected with their physical and moral condition. 

^'History. — In general, our Common School Educators think 
as lightly of the difficulties of History as they do of Grammar, or 
even of Religion. Accordingly, we have catechisms of the his- 
tories of all countries, and epochs, knowledge thinned down and 
diluted — for the ' tenderest capacities.' A child of eight or nine 
years old is thrown into the tangled parties of the Peloponnesian 
war, or the more unintelligible jargon of the Walpole and Pitt 
administrations. It is a jumble of idle words, thi^ough which, 
after wandering for months, and perhaps for year's, he comes 
out, with the recollection only of a painful dream. It would be 
happy, indeed, if it were always so; but if he never draws in 
knowledge, he often draws in error, and almost always preju- 
dice. Most of our abridgments, bad in an intellectual sense — as 
abridgments for young persons always are — in a moral sense, 
are abominable. They are catechisms of mutual distrust and 
dislike. Even ancient history is not beyond their reach. Whig 
and Tory have got into Athens and Sparta ; Catholic and PrO' 
testant have long taken possession of Rome ; Deist and Christian 
were lately to be seen in fierce encounter in Egypt, India, &c. 
History is a practical treatise of Metaphysics of the very highest 



Wyse on Education Reform, 37 

<3rcler, and can never, I am persuaded, be studied with any true 
profit on a lai'ge scale, or even without considerable risk, until 
a substantial course of metaphysical and ethical studies shall 
have first been completed. Instead of using it as an example 
for teaching philosophy, I would rather use philosophy to teach 
it. It would, therefore, be a great good to remodel the mode of 
studying it, or — if that be impracticable — to defer the study alto- 
gether, until the pupil be sufficiently gi'ounded in all the great 
principles of moral and social duty. As a complement, in this 
way, to an ethical course, it might be made an effective auxil- 
iary. Nor would I, therefore, substitute Chronology, no more 
than I would the latitude and longitude of places, for Geography. 
History is essentially a collection of facts, and not of dates — and 
in proportion as these facts are few, they ought to be fully de- 
veloped. 

" But History is too intimately connected with other studies, 
and too essential to their comprehension, to be wholly dispensed 
with, even in Elementary Education. It must be studied in order 
to study them. But Elementary Education is limited to a very 
few ; we are thus compelled to select the most obviously and 
immediately useful portions, if we do not wish, comparatively 
speaking, to sacrifice all. National history is unquestionably the 
most useful portion of histoz'y to every individual : it is what a 
nation should first study ; it is essentially the office of National 
Education to inculcate it ; but then it should be history, and not 
B, table of contents. Abstracts here will not do. At the same 
time, it is not intended to exclude every other. This would 
render even national history unintelligible. It should be seen in 
the general procession of events ; but while all others might be 
permitted to pass shadow-like before us, this should stay. The 
same analogy as in Geography should be observed. Our own 
country should be the centre — all others should form fainter and 
fainter circles around. A slight outline, beginning with Scrips 
tural and Eastern History, and proceeding onward to Grecian 
and Roman, might form the preface to the study, but then it 
should be treated like a preface. This would fix its place. It 
might, at first, be studied biographically. Biographies have just 
the same effect in history, as in real life. • Children, especially, 
care little for masses. Besides, it is not men, but man — the spirit 
of history, which it breathes into the inward heart, and from 
thence into the actions — and not the knowledge, the bookishness 

6 



38 Wyse on Education Reform. 

of history, we are anxious to teach. Later, indeed, we might 
proceed historically and regularly through the whole, but the 
more remarkable periods should alone detain us. 

" History, under these restrictions, may, not only as an exer- 
cise of morality, but as an exercise of reasoning, prove highly 
profitable. In the first spnse, a man who might feel himself 
little roused by the maxim, "v^■ill be kindled by the action. In the 
second, it opens a totally new field, and, perhaps, the most prac- 
.tically useful of all, for the exercise of our reasoning powers. 

" Legislation. — Connected with, and an almost necessary de- 
duction from, the study of History, is the study of Legislation. 
It is a strange anomaly in modern society, that it should be 
governed by laws, of which the majority of its members are to- 
tally ignorant. This, in a despotism, is natural and consistent ; 
in a barbarous community, perhaps inevitable. In one, the law 
being the will of the sovereign, controlled only by traditional 
habits, cannot be defined ; in the other, ignorance is content with 
such knowledge, as secures the mere material interests of the 
day. But in a free and enlightened community, it is absurd and 
immoral — obligation is coiTelative to knowledge of the obliga- 
tion. If the people are called on to obey, they ought to know 
what they are to obey. To preclude them from knowing, and 
to punish them for not knowing, exceeds even the injustice of a 
Rhadamanthus. 

" I am asked, Would you make our school-boys politicians 1 
I would not make them partizans. But, I ask in turn, why teach 
the catechism, why read the Bible I The first principles of our 
government and laws ought no more to make our youth secta- 
rians in politics, than the study of the first principles of Christ- 
ianity sectarians in religion. If we are partizans or sectarians in 
either, we ai-e often so by imitation or accident. ^Ve are bom 
Protestants, Catholics, and Presbyterians ; and we are born Ra- 
dicals, Whigs, and Tories. The evil dreaded exists already, prior 
to, and independent of, all direct instruction. Besides, our govern- 
ment contemplates and makes every man a practical politician ; 
audit is but common sense, that what an individual is obliged to 
practise as a man, he ought to learn as a youth. Every man in 
these countries, and in these times, has to act the politician ; and 
the question is, whether he shall act it well or ill. As things now 
are, there is a gi'eat deal of brute ignorance, or half knowledge, 
or confused and pernicious knowledge — a great deal worse than 



■ "Wyse on Education Reform. 39 

no knowledge at all. And how should it be otherwise ? Wha± 
are the sources from which it is obtained ? From the newspa- 
papers ; — and what newspapers ! — And these you make the edu- 
cators of youth — you allow them to take your place — and then 
you talk in sober earnest of not making partizans ! Why not 
then in consistency suppress your scripture lessons and you,r 
catechism, and surrender your pupils at once to tracts and con- 
troversy 1 — they will thus cease to be sectarians. 

" Political Economy is almost implied in the foregoing. Can 
we advance a step in any of the walks of life without feeling its 
influence] Is it not another term for the laws, which regulate 
our whole social existence 1 Is not the regulation of every por- 
tion dependent, in the first instance, on a due acquaintance with 
these laws 1 And all this being true, is it possible we can per- 
mit — I will not say approve — its exclusion, even from Elemen- 
tary Education," 

" But what have the lower classes to do with these functions, 
and this education ? We might as well be asked, what have 
they to do with rents, with labor, with prices 1 What have they 
to do with almost every interest of their social life ? This de- 
partment is theirs, if any be theirs ; if they are to have any 
education at all, this ought to be their education. Why do they 
pass — often in a single night — from people to populace, and from 
populace to mob — but fro-m some supposed infringement of their 
rights and interests — some panic, in which th-eir ignorance has a 
far larger share than their malignity % Why do they run after 
gold."? or cut off this or that intercourse with their neighbor, at 
the dictum of this or that Sir Oracle — such oracles upon such 
subjects ! but from the notorious confidence which uneducated 
men usually place in every audacious quack who takes the 
trouble to dupe them — a confidence quite natural, from their 
want of knowledge and consequent total incapacity to judge 
whether his nostrums will kill or cure. To extinguish charla- 
tanism, you must show the people where it lies, and what it is ; 
to detect falsehood, they must early be accustomed to truth. 
Half the evils of our poor law system would probably have been 
neutralized, by the diffusion of sound economical knowledge, at 
an earlier period of society ; by such knowledge, chiefly, are 
their consequences to be healed now. Nor let it be supposed, 
that such information is beyond their reach. That objection 
Miss Martineau has already refuted, in the best way in which it 



40 Wyse on Education Reform. 

could be accomplished. A few simple lessons, with such prac- 
tical illustrations from their actual condition as she has furnished, 
is the most impressive of all popular instruction, the most cal- 
culated for the capacity and social reform of the poor. Such 
books, and such teaching, should form an essential branch of ele- 
mentary education. The taste once given, food can be easily 
found for its gratification. Village libraries sliould be plentifully 
stocked with such prodtictions. They will make their way, when 
moral and religious works fail," 

" Domestic Economy. — Good Husbandry and good House- 
wifery are the two practical arts, of most use to our rural popu^ 
lation. They enter immediately into the three great classifica- 
tions of Education. No family, however limited, can be con- 
ducted without order, cleanliness, activity, good physical habits 
of all kinds ; none without a spirit of good feeling, recij)rocal 
kindness, peace, honesty, strict and persevering attention to 
moral duty ; finally, none without a competent knowledge of 
the best methods, the shortest and surest means to the wisest 
ends, how to put out to the fullest advantage their well-earned 
gains, how to spend with frugality and profit, how to economize 
with comfort and generosity. The difference between two fami- 
lies equally industrious and equally moral, will be just the dif- 
ference which exists between their respective knowledge. One 
starves with what to the other is competency, and sometimes 
superfluity. There is no happiness, and little morality, where 
there is not first a due provision for necessary physical wants. 
Education should, therefore, propose, as a primary object, the 
communicating, on each of these heads, concise, but clear and 
practical instructions. It should form, particularly among the 
lower classes, the most considerable portion of female Educa- 
tion. If the vices of the husband often reduce a family to beg- 
gary, these vices are frequently the result either of the indolence 
or the ignorance of the wife. Domestic Economics, well prac- 
tised, will be the best preventive of want, vice, and discontent — 
the best barrier against the hospital, the poor-house, the gin- 
shop, and the secret club. But to be practised, they must be 
known — to be known, they must be taught. The same mode 
of teaching may be adopted in their instance, as in others. Short 
intelligible treatises, ' Notions' not theoretic, but proved by 
practice to be practical, enforced by frequent reference to actual 
occurrences, and to their own habits and opinions, and illustrated 



Wyse on Education Reform. 41 

by amusing, but at the same time instructive tales, would be tlie 
soit of ' Manual' calculated to do the most good. This, and the 
treatises just mentioned, might thus form a small popular library, 
which, in process of time, it is to be hoped, would not only be 
found in every parish school, but in every cottage of every parish 
in the land." 

" Every school ought to be supplied to such degree, as its cir- 
cumstances may warrant, with objects of art. In the Elemen- 
tary schools, a few of the more remarkable busts of our great 
men — a certain number of familiar, but well executed engra- 
vings, connected especially with national recollections or domes- 
tic manners — should be associated with maps of geography, his- 
tory, zoology, &c. We constantly complain of the indifference 
of our people, not merely to the cultivation of the fine arts, but 
even to their preservation. In towns, statues are maimed, if 
not protected by iron bars and an ever-vigilant police ; in 
churches, fees are exacted as barriers against the indiscriminate 
vulgar; in palaces, tickets and permissions are necessary, in 
order to secure the proprietor against ail chance of injury to his 
property : we have no nice instincts amongst our people — no 
national love of the fine arts to rely on — to appeal to. In Italy, 
every man is a protector of these productions, for every man is 
an admirer. The Vatican, on Sundays, is crowded with Sabine 
mountaineers, quietly enjoying their walk through the noble 
works of sculpture and painting with which its galleries are so 
profusely adorned. The festival of the Adobbo of Bologna has 
year after year taken place, without a scratch occurring to a 
single picture.* Yet our shops are open, and our parks unin- 
jured. The reason of the difference is simple : our Education 
is commercial, but not cBsthetic. To complain of the effect is 
puerile ; it is to complain that we reap what we have sown. A 
habit of seeing and understanding — but above all, oi feeling 
these pleasures at an early period, would make them pleasures 
during the remainder of life. Bull-baits, and boxing-matches, 
and cock-fights, might perhaps still continue ; but this would be 
one more means of weaning the people from those gladiatorial 
amusements natural only to an uncivilized or degenerate popu- 
lace. Though we should not form a nation of amateurs, which 
is not to be looked for, we should form a nation capable of 

" * The Octave of Corpus Christi. During its continuance, the most pre- 
cious paintings and tapestry are hung up in the public streets." 



42! Wi/se on Education Reform. 

knowing and loving the arts ; we should multiply the moral ten- 
dencies ; we should augment the moral pleasures ; in a word, 
we should raise the entire being many degrees higher in the spi- 
ritual scale." 

" There are three descriptions of instruction : 1. Individual ; 
2. Simultaneous ; 3. Mutual. We shall examine each. 

" 1. Individual Instruction is, in some particulars, the best. 
The value of Instruction often depends, more upon the receiver, 
than upon the giver ; at all events, and in all cases, upon their 
adaptation to each other. The avenue to one child's mind is not 
the same as to that of another. Each must be studied ; and that 
study is not matter of a glance. A child is often more difficult 
to be deciphered than a man. If this be true, it follows that in- 
dividual teaching has great advantages, wherever it is practi- 
cable, over most others. But this is not the case in schools. To 
call up boy after boy, and to put each through his lesson, is giving 
and hearing tasks individually, but not teaching. A master fol- 
lowing this process, will, at the end of the year, know just as 
little of his pupils, as when he began. ' Come like shadows, so 
depart,' — is often soberly and prosaically true. In a small . 
school, indeed, this difficulty, by a zealous and intelligent mas- 
ter, may probably be overcome ; and in such cases individual 
instruction would, no doubt, be unobjectionable; but then the 
school must be very small. Where it is otherwise, the evil, I 
am afraid, is irremediable : and it is not only an evil, but the 
fertile principle of many others. What is the boy to do, or rather 
the boys, whilst the single pupil is before the single master? 
How many cries for attention ; for order ; for silence ! What 
indifference to these cries ; what indolence, carelessness — list- 
lessness, on every side, but within the immediate sacred pre- 
cincts of the pulpit, or desk ! But what is the effect of all this 
on the pupil under examination, and on his examiner % What 
are the effects on his temper — on his intelligence — on his con- 
duct % Task-repetition is fatal to any thing like natural impulse ; 
but repetition with endless distractions and interruptions — repe- 
tition from which every thing like mind is excluded — is a punish- 
ment, a torture, worse than that of the tread-mill itself. The 
pupil considers himself the victim, reluctantly forced from his 
play-fellows, incapable of perceiving any sort of utility in all 
these exercises, and thinking only how, and when, he may best 
escape from their infliction. The master, on his side, is regard- 



Wyse on Education Reform. 43 

ed as the executioner, and exposed to the half-suppressed gibe, 
or, in all cases, to the smothered detestation of his pupils. Is 
this a position for either % Are these the appropriate rewards 
of the master ; are these the forming exercises of the scholar 1 
I can see in all this, nothing but an immense waste of precious 
time — great abuse of means — great injury to intellect and cha- 
racter — great perversion of all the true purposes of education. 
This, in large schools, is inevitable ; — 'but why not, then, have 
small ones 1 We are too economical a generation for that. If 
we could educate by steam, and by millions, no matter how 
badly, provided it were also cheaply, I have little doubt we 
should risk the experiment, and congratulate ourselves on the 
happy audacity of the thought. It would diminish the national 
debt, by some few hundreds of pounds, and our reports would 
look as creditable on the table of the House — as they do now. 
Who is there that does not feel that Education is but a section 
of Financed ' Virtus ^os^ nummos.' Our purses first, and our 
minds afterwards. If both objects can be accomplished, so much 
the better ; but at all events, and under all circumstances, our 
purses. 

" This being the case, we have only to consider how the evil 
may be alleviated. Two remedies are recommended : Simul- 
taneous and Mutual Instruction. 

" 2. Simultaneous Instruction. — The inconvenience to which 
we have just alluded — a large school and a single master— firsS 
suggested this expedient to Pestalozzi. ' He pronounced every 
thing to his pupils loudly and distinctly, and was thus led to the 
idea of making them draw, write, and work at the same time' 
Th« effect be describes as * meteoric,' producing a sudden re- 
volution in the child's mind, and at once rousing him to the ful- 
lest intellectual activity. It has long since been adopted in our 
infant, and other schools, but not with equal success. The cause 
is obvious. Union, simultaneous action of any kind — clapping 
of hands, stamping of feet — has a great charm for all classes 
and ages, but especially for the uncultivated,, and very young. 
The most monotonous air delights a child, and a savage. I doubt 
whether an anchor could be heaved without the sailors' call and 
chorus. The measuring of time, though low in the intellectual 
scale, is an ingredient of the delight which all combined move- 
ment produces. If we add to this, tone, we have the elements 
of music ; and if to music, the feelings of kindly affection or 



44 Wi/se on Education Reform. 

religious aspiration, the impression becomes one of the most 
powerful of which we are susceptible. Pestalozzi was then 
right in making use of so powerful a lever in education. But 
Pestalozzi knew where to stop. He carried it as far as it would 
go, but no farther. He applied it only to very young childi-en, 
and not on every occasion. He never used it for the purpose of 
bringing a subject for the ^rst time before his pupils, but con-^ 
fined it solely to repetition. The analysis was first gone through^ 
separately, by each child; the lesson written down by the 
master on the board : then simultaneously for the first time ex- 
pressed by the pupils — then rubbed out, and sung from recol- 
lection ; and sometimes, finally, in place of it, a new number or 
analysis substituted extempore. All this materially differs from 
the sing-song repetition of pence tables, multiplication tables, 
&c., &c., but especially from the hymns, religious or otherwisOj 
which children of that ag& can scarcely understand, but which 
are nearly universal in our public schools. So far from such 
methods being Pestalozzian, they are a libel on Pestalozzi. 
They are empty forms, but not Education. 

" But though repetition una voce, and the Teacher's board, go 
far to bring into harmony of thought and action a whole school, 
however numerous, and so multiply exceedingly the power of 
the teacher, yet it was soon discovered that its application was 
limited, and that the moment that children had got beyond the 
elements, a more specific degree of instruction became requisite. 
How was this to be accomplished 1 The master could not teach 
each individual pupil ; simultaneous instruction was inadequate ; 
to multiply his assistants was beyond his means. He adopted 
the only expedient left him. The elder pupils were taught, 
and trained to teach the younger. He called in the aid of 
Mutual Instruction. 

" 3. Mutual Instruction. — Few methods have been more over- 
tated, and underrated, both in their principles and applications, 
than this same method of Mutual Instruction. 

" Throwing out of consideration all this nonsense, and taking 
it for granted that the real objections have been in great degree 
overcome, it must be admitted, that the system of Mutual In- 
struction possesses very numerous advantages, in large public 
schools, over all others. Pupils, monitoi's, master, all benefit, 
and not merely intellectually, but morally. The pupils and the 
monitors both learn, and both in the most effective and agreeable 



Wyse on Education Reform. 45 

manner — and both learn constantly and methodically. The 
pupils are taught by persons of their own age, and as nearly as 
possible of their own degree of proficiency ; an immense advan- 
tage when competent, from the facilities it affords the pupil in 
proposing his difficulties, and the assurance it gives that he will 
not be distanced altogether by his teacher. The monitor derives 
scarcely less profit from his tuition. It is only by exercise and 
repetition, especially in young minds, exposed, as they neces- 
sarily must be, to the pressure and distraction of a host of new 
ideas, that knowledge can be thoroughly imprinted. Few have 
the memory of paper — most, the memory of sto.ne. But this 
repetition is by no means verbal. On the contrary, it is a recast- 
ing, a remodelling of instruction already received — a fitting it 
for use — adapting it for prompt and general communication, to 
others. It is in communicating knowledge, we best ascertain 
how much we really possess ; it is by bringing our money to 
light, we are enabled to distinguish the base from the good coin. 
Each pupil is thus a teacher to the monitor, not less than the 
monitor to him. He gains, also, by his new position in relation 
to the master. He enjoys largely all the advantages of indivi- 
dual education. He gains it as the reward of merit; and thus 
instruction itself becomes, as it should be, not a pain, but the 
strongest stimulant to mental exertion. Nor is the master with- 
out his share in the general profit. He is spared the tedium of 
technicalism ; he has no dreary task-work to toil through ; he is 
permitted to use his powers and acquirements in a manner the 
most consonant to his own feelings, and the most advantageous 
to the improvement of his pupils. It is quite a different thing, 
hearing the same eternal verb, mangled by sixty listless children 
in succession, and passing from circle to circle, witnessing in 
each the most active exhibition of their several faculties, and 
receiving frequently, from these uncontrolled displays, lights for 
the management of the characters and understandings of his 
pupils, quite impossible (if ever, indeed, they were sought for) 
under the old systems. But these benefits are slight, compared 
to its moral influence. In the old system, the relation in which 
he stood towards the master, necessarily exacted from him habits 
of submission ; but this submission, having for its object the will 
(often very arbitrary) of an individual, and fear generally for its 
motive, was of too servile a nature to exalt or develope the 
moral being. The submission under the Mutual Instruction 

7 



46 • Wyse on Education Rrform. 

system, is paid cheerfully, though to a child, often inferior in 
position and age ; and is the expression of the purest and no- 
blest feelings of our nature, love of, order, respect for the law, 
and a deep conviction of the power and rights of intellectual 
superiority. There are few, however humble, who have not, 
under their direction, at one period or other of life, one or more 
individuals, and thus are called on to give proofs of good 
feeling, patience, just and disci-eet exercise of authority ; under 
the old systems the child always called on to obey had no oppor- 
tunity of practising these virtues. The system of Mutual In- 
struction, on the contrary, by alternately placing him in the 
position of teacher and of taught, of superiority and inferiority, 
naturally enforces the exercise of the qualities demanded by 
each, on one side the duties of humility and obedience, and on 
the other, the modesty, mildness, and impartiality, which ought 
always to be inseparable from the exercise of power. Each 
individual is intrusted with a certain share of ability, not for his 
own use only, but for the use and happiness of his fellows. This 
truth cannot be too deeply or too early imprinted on the young 
mind, if we would effectively strike at the root of that miserable 
egotism from which the great vices of modern Education, and 
consequently of modern Civilization, as we have already urged, 
proceed ; but this was scarcely practicable under the old sys- 
tems. The pupil, solely passive, exclusively in communication 
with the master, had no opportunities afforded him of spreading 
that superabundance of life which exists within him largely and 
usefully abroad. The system of Mutual Instruction presents 
these means. Nothing can be more interesting than to see the 
eagerness with which a child essays his young powers, the variety 
of expedients to which he recurs to captivate the attention of 
his little class, the earnestness with which he labors to infuse into 
their minds the spirit as well as language of instruction ; disci- 
pline better calculated cannot be conceived to prepare the future 
parent for the high duty of instructing his children, or the future 
citizen for assisting in the moral and intellectual advancement 
of his country. 

" It has already been remarked, that the activity, the spii-it, 
the pleasure with which all this is carried on, tending naturally 
to produce great frankness and freedom of opinion, gives the 
teacher innumerable advantages in the management of Intellec- 
tual Education. Th^y are still more strikingly of service in 



Wi/se on Education Reform. 47 

moral. No censure is more severe or more just than that of 
well-educated children. They exercise an influence over each 
other, when properly organized, far more rapid and energetic 
than that of any master, however vigilant. The social vices — 
arrogance, self-sufficiency, falsehood, deceit; selfishness, in fine, 
in all its disguises, are soon discovered by this juvenile police, 
and are sure to receive from their unanimous reprobation the 
punishment of all others the best applied and the most deeply 
felt by the delinquent. 

" The advantages, in an economical and mechanical point of 
view, in the easy maintenance of discipline, in the complete em- 
ployment of time, have long been fully recognised. Under any 
modification these advantages must appear. But those just in- 
stanced are of a different description ; they depend for their 
efficiency altogether on the means taken to qualify for their 
duties the monitors. If these be efficacious, the teacher and 
the parent may confidently look forward to the results which 
have been just described. If otherwise, no substitute, however 
plausible, will be found to answer in their place. The dispro- 
portion, confusion, and anarchy, which will inevitably ensue, 
will render progress of every kind impossible. Instead of the 
best. Mutual Instruction will rapidly degenerate, and be found 
in practice the very worst of the three systems. 

" The three systems are supposed to be essentially distinct — 
to exclude each other. Simultaneous Instruction is fitted, it is 
said, for infant schools; Mutual for Elementary, &c. &c. This, 
indeed, would be limiting their benefits within a narrow com- 
pass. They are each capable of combining with the other, and 
of extending to all. Mutual Instruction, in particular, in the 
lower classes, may be united with Simultaneous ; in the higher, 
with Individual Instruction. At no stage should they be kept 
totally separate. They are applicable to the pariah school and 
to the University. Professor Pilans has justified the theory by 
very successful practice in both. 

"A second question deserving our consideration, is the distri- 
bution of the duty of instruction amongst the teachers. Some 
prefer the division by classes, i. e. confiding one class, without 
reference to its studies, to one master : others, the division by 
suhjects, i. e. dividing the different subjects, without reference to 
the class, amongst different masters. This discussion between 
the " Classen system" and the " Facher system," as they are re- 



48 Wyse on Education Reform. 

spectively designated, has engaged a good deal of attention in 
Germany and Switzerland, bat it is a question almost solely of 
circumstance. Considered abstractedly, without reference to 
considerations of time or place, strong reasons may be adduced 
in favor of either. The first offers greater facilities in the prose- 
cution of certain studies, and the development of special 
branches ; the second secures the moral interests of the pupil 
more perfectly, and preserves more truly the harmony and equi- 
librium between his several acquirements and faculties. If 
compelled to select one to the exclusion of the other, the last is 
to be preferred; but there is no reason why both may not be 
combined. In the elementary schools, no very ample develop- 
ment is required ; the same master may, without inconvenience, 
manage the entire : not so in the higher classes of the middle, 
and in the entire course of Special Schools. In proportion as 
the pupil advances, his education, in order to accord with 
his wants, must necessarily take a more special cast. Some 
branches maybe omitted, — others will require to be very greatly 
extended. The " Facher system" here becomes essential, — the 
inconveniences arising from its moral defects, or the contradic- 
tory pi'etensions of the several masters, may be easily obviated 
by the superintending control of a principal or head master ; by 
the precision of the school regulations ; the unity established 
between the several branches, and by public examinations. 

" A third point to be determined is, the form of instruction : 
what methods of teaching should the master prefer ] In the 
lower schools, where it is especially necessary to lead the child 
to mental exertion, the method of analysis is the most eligible. 
The pupil must examine, observe, develope, combine, appro- 
priate, and apply the ideas he acquires ; he must do this in great 
measure by liiinself. This cannot be effected by heaping on him 
in a crude form the ideas oi others. Such a process will absorb 
his intellectual activity; leave him little time and less disposi- 
tion for reflection ; prevent him from putting to any profit the 
knowledge he has acquired ; extinguish all desire for discovery, 
and leave him at last to languish in a general intellectual para- 
lysis. These are not the effects of the Analytic method. On 
the contrary, it demands from the pupil constant exertion, but in 
return, it gives the stimulant of constant interest, and constant 
gratification. Positive acquirements, visibly increasing accumu- 
lations, are the flattering results. In the higher classes, princi- 



Wyse on Education Reform. 49 

pies are already fully established : the pupil, it is to he supposed, 
is thoroughly in possession of the elements. He is therefore 
engaged, not merely in acquiring information, but in arranging 
it for applieation. The more precision, the more compression 
he gives to his knowledge, the more easy will this application 
become. Such advantages he will find in Synthesis. He may 
now, therefore, without injury, retrace his methods, and pro- 
ceeding from axioms and definitions, for the Analytic substitute 
the Synthetic. 

But it must not, therefore, be inferred that these methods are 
incompatible — the reverse — analysis cannot be carried on to 
any extent without the aid of Synthesis, neither is Synthesis 
possible without previous Analysis. It is only meant, that each 
process should respectively predominate in that department or 
stage of education to which by its nature it is most especially 
adapted. 

" On these principles must immediately depend the form of 
instruction in each branch of education. Intuition, simple 
intuition is the best adapted to the very young. The child 
may be allowed to make his observations without any direct 
assistance. The teacher is scarcely required to intervene : all 
he has to do, amounts to little more than to see that nothing 
thwarts the wise education of nature. If he does interfere, he 
should confine himself merely to arranging and presenting 
objects, in such order and manner as may most attract attention, 
and render observation easy and useful. As the child advances, 
more aid will be required; but it should still be dispensed with 
great economy. The teacher should rather stimulate than 
satisfy ; he should see that his pupil observes, examines, judges ; 
but, so far from forcing on him his own explanations, much 
less his own authority, without explanation, he should be very cau- 
tious how he even answers all the questions which are proposed. 
We often mistake for curiosity, mere giddiness and vanity. A 
child who desires an answer, and to whom an answer will be of 
use, will think some time, and search himself, before he goes to 
another. It ought to be the object of the instructor to increase 
this feeling, to throw the child in upon his own resources, and 
make it work out its own mind. It will hence be easily con- 
ceived, how misapplied, at such a stage, lectures, and long les- 
sons, and tedious readings, must be. They who indulge in such 



50 Wyse on Education Reform. 

laborious follies, will soon oppress their child with words, and 
render him incapable and unwilling to acquire any thing else. 
He will lean on the reason of others, and live and die almost 
ignorant of his oionP 

" Connected with daily instruction, are periodical Examina- 
tions. They are recommended as a means of assuring its accu- 
racy, and permanency, and as a strong stimulant to all species of 
mental exertion. Repetitions certainly are so. The strongest 
memory requires a frequent recurrence to its already acquired 
knowledge, not merely with a view of retaining it safely, but of 
keeping it always clear and ready for application. Examinations 
are only more extended repetitions. They ai-e destined for the 
same purposes. But in their application, too much pains cannot 
be taken, to render them really profitable. As tests, society has 
a right to require them : as proofs, individuals have an interest 
in submitting to them. But, that they should be rendered truly 
available to both these views, they should be inquests, and not 
formularies. They should be sufficiently extended to preclude 
the possibility of attributing success or failure to accident, ajid 
sufficiently secure and careful to constitute a real proof of desert. 
The Examiners, for obvious reasons, should, when practicable, 
be selected from persons not in connexion with the candidates : 
they should examine at different intervals, not merely the nature 
and amount of acquirements, but also what degree of facility the 
pupils possess in applying them to use. This will be peculiarly 
necessary in the Special schools, from the greater development 
demanded. Care should be taken to distinguish between differ- 
ent tempers and minds, and so to arrange and diversify the 
methods and queries, that the examination may be accommodated 
to each, and to all. A good answerer viva voce may be compa- 
ratively feeble on paper ; a good writer (master, moreover, of 
his subject) may either, from want of exercise, or natural timid- 
ity, be incapable of answering viva voce questions. None should 
be defrauded of a fair opportunity of putting forth their respect- 
ive powers. If prefei'ence, however, is to be given to any me- 
thod, written questions have undoubtedly the best claim. They 
most effectually try the real stufl" of a pupil's knowledge and 
intellect, and remove to a great degree all extraneous embar- 
rassments. 

" Such are the general means v/ith which a teacher is intrusted 
— such the more obvious processes for the communication of 



' JVi/se on Education Reform. 51 

knowledge, in other words, for the useful management of public 
Instruction. It will have been perceived that they involve con- 
siderations scarcely less important to the due education of the 
pupil, than the nature of the instruction itself. Knowledge may 
be knowledge — sound and useful knowledge — but it does not 
exist for the scholar, unless the means also exist for transferring 
it with ease and certainty to the scholar's mind. To know is one 
thing, to teach is another. A teacher, it is true, cannot commu- 
nicate more knowledge than he possesses ; yet he may possess 
much, and still be able to impart but little. The knowledge of 
Sir Isaac Newton could be but of trifling use to a school, while 
it was locked up safely in the head of a country schoolmaster. 
What ought really to interest us is, that part of a teacher's know- 
ledge which we are likely to get, not that which we certainly 
cannot get. Yet this is almost the last thing we inquire after. 
We are anxious to ascertain how much the teacher knows, not 
how much he can communicate. The preceding observations 
point out some of the instruments by which this can be accom- 
plished. Instructors and pupils must be made to understand 
each other. There must be an intelligible language between 
them to enable the former to open his head and his heart, and 
infuse into the other some af the thoughts and feelings which lie 
hid there. At present this language scarcely exists. They may 
use the same words : but this can hardly be called the same lan- 
guage, while they attach to them such very diflerent meanings. 
We must either, by some supernatural power, bring children up 
to the understanding of teachers, or our teachers must unlearn 
themselves, and come down to the comprehension of children. 
The last of these alternatives is only difficult — the first is impos- 
sible. 

" Moral and Religious Education. — They who would build the 
great work of human perfection, without calling to their aid. the 
chief instrument by which it is to be accomplished, attempt not 
merely an impossibility, and secure only a failure, but render 
dubious, and frequently injurious, those very acquisitions for 
which they have already labored with so much care. The Edu- 
cation of the moral man is the education of the most essential 
portion of our nature. We shall find in the other educations, 
which have preceded it, auxiliaries, as long only as they are kept 
in subordination. The moment they rebel, they are its worst 
foes." 



52 Wyst on Education Reform. 

Amongst the matters of Useful Knowledge included in 
Mr. Wyse's list, are Metaphysics and Music. In our review 
of this work, we confess we are chiefly actuated by the desire 
of trying its applicability to common school education; we 
have therefore avoided entering upon particular considera- 
tions of the former of these two points. Its cultivation in any 
important degree, is all but incompatible with the limited 
means of common school teaching. With respect to Mwsic, 
it is cultivated in every description of seminary in Prussia and 
Germany, and, we believe, may be made indirectly the me- 
dium of much good. But the project itself is a new one, and 
its details require to be wrought out at large, and distinct 
from other considerations. We therefore pass it by for the 
present, as only clogging more important matters, although 
we shall rejoice sincerely to see a system of popular educa- 
tion, so arranged and digested, as to include this branch with- 
out its interfering with the cultivation of others more imme- 
diately in request. 

Mr. Wyse then proceeds to JEsthetics, or the cultivation of 
the feelings ; and here again we are under the necessity of 
passing by much solid argument, as being inapplicable to 
the purpose we have chiefly in view, but which is highly 
deserving the attention of principals of private academies, 
and persons connected with collegiate establishments. There 
are particulars, however, under this head, M^hich are directly 
applicable to popular purposes. Such, are the following : 

" The first feeling to be formed is that of ' Order' — it is useful 
to the boy, but to the school it is indispensable ; nothing can go 
on without it. Here is the first sacrifice of self to others, the first 
restraint, the first direction of the Will. The pupil feels intensely 
the sense, the enjoyment of his own activity. He is as yet with- 
out an object — his only want for the present is to develope this 
faculty. Precepts of order, moderation, tranquillity, appear unne- 
cessary, appear vexatious. But the submission which is required 
of him, is required of all. The teacher yields as well as the 
pupil to the universal law ; advantages result to both from its 
observance ; he begins to experience personally its utility ; his 
self-love is at first interested, then a nobler feeling, and he at 



Wyse on Educatio7i Reform. 53 

last adopts the restrictions himself, and aids by his adoption in 
recommending and finally in impressing them on others. This 
feeling, from constant exercise, soon becomes habit, and this habit 
is a direct counterpoise to the caprices of Will. It is hencefor- 
ward subjected, in some degree, to certainty and regularity. 

" The next feeling to be developed is the sense of 'Justice.' 
The public school, the circumstances of living in common, is 
particularly favorable to its culture. The young comer is soon 
taught by the pupils themselves, that if he would guard his own 
individual rights and interests fi"om encroachment, he must 
respect those of others. Hence reciprocity. He becomes pa- 
tient in difficulties — modest to his superiors — kind to his inferiors 
— equitable to all. He carries this from his actions to his words, 
and from his words to his thoughts. The means of keeping 
within due limits, the spirit of independence, are found. So far 
now from its degenerating into abuse, it is in proportion to the 
strength and vividness with which he feels it himself, that he 
regards and honors its existence in others. But these feelings 
are still tinged with self; we must get beyond this — they must 
be faither ennobled and exalted by the feeling of ' Benevolence' 
and ' Generosity.' The spirit of community has already taught 
him to respect the interests of his companions ; but this is not 
enough, he should feel an interest in them, he should join in 
them, he should assist them ; he should know the uses and the 
pleasures of co-operation. The feelings of self-sacrifice, of self- 
forgetfulness, of sympathy, of kindliness, are now expanded; 
they should be made constant — habitual, to all. All should be 
taught to look for their happiness to the happiness of each ; each 
to look to the well being, and progress, and prosperity of all. 
Where these habits are thoroughly planted, a spirit of true fra- 
ternity soon arises, approximating a school in some degree to the 
image of a large family. From the exercise of such qualities 
follows mutual esteem, and from esteem affection ; affection ele- 
vates, and purifies, and spreads the young mind abroad, upon a 
new creation, upon all other things besides self Each lesson, 
each example, of good now rapidly communicates to all, 'inter- 
penetrates' all — educates all. The teacher will not only be felt 
in every young spirit, but each will imperceptibly become the 
cheerful fellow-laborer and co-operator of the teacher. 

" Connected with these more elevated impulses of our nature 
is the sense of the ' Noble,' and ' Pure,' and ' Beautiful' in mo- 



54 Wyse on Education Reform. 

rals. Here, again, we enter on Esthetics ; so harmoniously are 
linked together all the faculties and sensibilities of our nature. 
The exultation with which we hear the recital of some glorious 
act by which millions were saved by the self-devotion of one, or 
the unblenching constancy of some tender martyr to truth and 
conscience, or the heroism of a brave and righteous man strug- 
gling singly against oppression, though struggling in vain, this ■ 
exultation is somehow or other akin to that which we experience 
in gazing upon the boundless ocean, or the calm midnight hea- 
vens, or the thunderstorm on its way, or in some instances even 
upon the wonders of human art. Through all a single principle 
seems to pervade ; an indefinite sense of a nature still loftier than 
our present ; a nature of which even this is but the faint image 
and foretaste, a perfection of which these are only the occasional 
out-shootings, a glory which we are still condemned to see as 
through a veil. Our hearts are full, and our eyes are moist, and 
our tongues are silent with these overpowering emotions : at no 
period do we so thoroughly feel the dignity of our origin and 
destination. Such feelings are not vii'tue, but they dispose for 
virtue. They warm and break the soil for the reception of the 
sacred seed. They cannot recur too frequently or penetrate too 
deeply, into the young mind. Unless there be enthusiasm in 
youth, there will scarcely be feeling in old age. There must be 
poetry and passion even in our virtue, to make it work broadly 
or vigorously. The 'just enough' will oftener be within the 
mark, oftener not enough, than enthusiasm will be beyond it. 

" But there still remains the conclusion — the perfecting of this 
moral development. It is necessary that these feelings of 
' Order,' * Justice,' Generosity,' this elevation and extension of 
the sympathetic affections — this sense of the * Noble' and ' Pure' 
and ' Beautiful' in morals, should receive its highest character 
from the feeling of ' Religion.' These may do much ; they may 
prepare, they may dispose; but it is only by this last that a really 
wholesome and steady direction can be impressed upon the 
Will. The individual Will of man is subject to his individual 
fluctuations and errors. The most perfect means of securing it 
from either is, the placing it in true harmony with the universal 
and eternal Will of God. 

" Habits are the result chiefly of exercise ; and exercise, 
therefore, in moral and religious Education, should be our 
chief consideration. But how induce this exercise ? All 



Wyse on Education Reform. 5§ 

admit its necessity, but how many fail in its application. Com- 
pulsion has long been tried, and unsuccessfully. This is 
natural. Why should that which ought to be a pleasure, 
be taught by force, and be made a pain. It is a process 
for driving out one vice, by planting another. ■ You make 
the pupil obedient by first making him a coward, then a slave. 
Virtue, under such a system, must be hypocrisy or inertness* 
A boy who is forbidden to speak and act, will cease to think ; 
or, if he thinks, it will be for himself, and not for you. 

" Brute force is then the worst of all agencies to wield our 
moral and intellectual nature. We must use something similar 
to itself. Fortunately we have numerous powers of the kind. 
We have the influence of the teacher on the pupils ; of the 
pupils on each other ; of the pupil on himself. 

" The teacher knows little of his profession, if he does not 
know that no faculty in a child is stronger than imitation ; con- 
sequently, no influence more powerful than example. Let him 
he his lesson, and it will soon penetrate. Let him, in the inter- 
course of every day, of every hour, seize every avenue, to instil, 
by deed, the sacred theme. Let him be just, and generous, and 
mild, and kind himself, and he will have already preached, and 
more than preached, these virtues to his scholars. In the sci- 
ence of the young heart, their unobtrusive voice will soon be 
heard. He will be sui-prised by the blossom and the fruit, even 
before he imagines the root has struck. Virtue is to be caught — 
it can infect as well as vice. Yet this is never remembered. 
The Catechism tells the child to conquer his anger, to be just, 
to be kind to all. The Teacher refutes the lesson by his par- 
tiality and violence. The Catechism enjoins him to tell 
truth to all men. The Teacher modifies the injunction j tell 
vne always the truth, thoiigh you must not expect that I should 
always tell it to you. The Catechism teaches that we are all 
brethren. The Teacher, that this or that man, because he thinks 
differently, is an enemy ; and that it is possible to be a Christian 
and a Persecutor at the same time. Which of the two is he to 
believe, which is he to follow ? Mind not the preacher, but 
what he preaches, is an old adage, but it is a practicable one. 
Men appeal, and will appeal, as long as they are men, much 
moi'e to the conduct of the pi^eacher than to his doctrine. What 
(Other proof have they of his sincerity ] and why should he call 
■on them to believe what it is so evident he does not believe him- 



56 Wyse on Education Reform. 

self? But if grown men think and act thus, why should not 
children ? Why should we insist that they, who are all sensation, 
should be more spiritual than ourselves 1 Children universally 
appeal from the book to the man ; and they do right. It is 
reason in them. But what are we to think of the conduct of the 
master 1 Simply, that, in nine cases out of ten, to him are owing 
all the vice and ignorance of his school. 

" Children must not be permitted to command before they are 
first habituated to obey — but a beaten servant makes a bad mas- 
ter, and no tyrant is worse than the manumitted slave. This 
should not be our practice. The code of our little community 
should rest on the universal will — it should have for its execu- 
tive the universal honor and love. So legislated for, and so 
governed, there would be little to apprehend from treachery or 
rebellion. The teacher would have only to permit — all his 
functions would be directive. Habits of virtue would form of 
themselves — the force to form them would come from within. 

" If punishment is to be used at all, let it be used, except in 
very rare cases, in private. There it will work all the good 
within its reach. Nor let the prohibitory code be so complicated 
and so crowded, as to expose to the chances of frequent trans- 
gression. The spirit, the spirit, is the great object ; that se- 
cured, give yourself little pain about the rest. Least of all, let 
it not, after the example of more pretending legislation, create 
imaginary crimes, or crimes only such in reference to temporary 
or local circumstances, and graduated, for the most part, not ac- 
cording to their intrinsic depravity, but in reference solely to 
the prejudice or convenience of the lawgiver. A more serious 
insult to common sense, a more direct injury to the virtue and 
understanding of your pupil, cannot be perpetrated. Not only 
is it rank injustice in itself, but it confounds all notions of justice 
or injustice. And yet, after having laboriously and cruelly taught 
this lesson for years together, to your pupil, you send him out 
into the world, and then talk to parents (as your prospectus re- 
quires) of ' your excellent moral and religious Education.' 

" But if the propriety of punishment ba so little questioned, 
it can hardly be expected that much suspicion can exist in the 
public mind on the propriety of reward. The great merit of 
many schools, in the mind even of rational men, is the number 
and liberality of their prizes, medals, place-takings, &c. It is 
amusing to see such a scale applied, at least to moral Educa- 



Wyse on Education Reform. 57 

tion. Emulation may excite to competitioi], and competition 
lead to exertion, and exertion terminate in success — but 
so also may Fear. We have not to look to the results only, as 
has already been remarked, but to the causes which produce 
them. Is emulation to be encouraged 1 that is the entire of the 
question. If in itself good, there cannot possibly he any objec- 
tion to its being serviceably employed. If otherwise, even 
though serviceable, the instrument should be discarded. 

" Emulation is a more dignified vanity, or envy — in its higher 
developments, undoubtedly it may, in great degree, be purified 
from such base alloy — but the danger of the abuse is great, and 
its corrupting effects most pernicious. No one vice is more 
completely opposed to those virtues which ought to be the espe- 
cial characteristics of the youthful heart than envy. Frankness, 
generosity, elevation of character, soon shrink up, when once 
this withering canker has got into their blossoms.- If there must 
be rivalry, let it be unprovoked. The stimulus is powerful 
enough without our artificial additions. Nor is this the only 
evil. It is substituting a paltry principle of action for a noble 
one, teaching practically that there are not in the pursuit itself 
sufficient charms, and that we must rely, for progress in know- 
ledge and goodness, not on goodness or knowledge themselves, 
but on miserable secondary considerations, at the discretion of 
an individual. True it is, that such is the education of the 
world — but it is one of those portions of its education, which, 
so far from seconding, we should rather endeavor to counteract. 
The time will come fast enough when the prize will have far 
more influence with us than the manner by which it was won. 

" But Education, as it now is organized, cannot work on with- 
out these excitements. Perhaps so — but this is only another 
amongst many reasons for reorganizing Education. I question 
much, however, whether this be really the case. It is certainly 
not a necessary deduction from the character of the youthful 
mind. These excitements will not be required, if not proffered. 
Unless the pupil be first vitiated by their application, he will not 
feel their loss. If he must have competitors, make him compete 
wkh Mmself. Let him compare to-day with yesterday — this 
month with the last. It will only be an extension of his system 
of self-inquiry. Let him triumph in the victory over this or that 
passion — let him enjoy the acquisition of this or that science. 
It will suffice. These are triumphs without alloy — pleasures 



58- JVi/sc on Education Reform. 

which will last. Do I ascribe too much heroism to the young 
pupil — do I draw too much upon what ought to be, with too 
little reference to what is ] I merely urge the extension of a 
change, as practicable as it is just. It is fact. It has been 
tried — wherever tried, it has been with the most signal success. 
" Habits, then, but habits produced, and cultivated to their 
full vigor, by the processes just recommended, are the forces 
which we must create, if we desii'e to impress a salutary direc- 
tion upon the Will. But one only of these processes, the culti- 
vation of the feelings, has yet been considered. The culti- 
vation of the feelings must be accompanied bythe instilment of 
sound principles. Sound principles are the result of Religious 
and Moral Instruction." 

We cannot too seriously or too strongly call the attention 
of teachers and parents to the following passage. All who 
are earnestly desirous to promote religious feelings in the 
young, and wish to inculcate a reverence for the sacred 
volume, must agree, we think, in the sagacious remarks 
given here by the author. We know many who have 
adopted a practice similar to that which is here recommended, 
but the general view is at once so full and so concise, that we 
think it could hardly have been set before us more advanta- 
geously. 

" In teaching Religion and Morality, we naturally look for the 
best code of both. Where is it to be found ? There are many 
excellent. No nation has been without gloamings of the light, 
in the noon of its darkness ; without occasional vouchsafings, 
from Providence, of the truth. Yet the merit even of the purest 
is relative. They were wonderful for the time, singular in the 
nation ; their glory is to have anticipated, or to have approached, 
the best. But where is that best to be found ? Where but in 
the Holy Scriptures ? Where but in that speaking and vivifying 
code, teaching by deed, and sealing its doctrines by death, are 
we to find the law of Truth, of Justice, of Love, which has been 
the thirst and hunger of the human heart, in every vicissitude 
of its history. From the mother to the dignitary, this ought to 
be the Book of Books; it should be laid by the cradle and the 
death-bed ; it should be the companion and the counsellor, and 



Wyse on Education Reform. 59 

the consoler, the Urim and Thummim, the light and perfection 
of all eai'thly existence. But, in earnestly insisting on the 
teaching, I am not insensible to the manner in which it should 
be taught. On this depends every thing — this it is which 
makes it good or bad. It is not enough to teach the Scriptures ; 
we must remember wliom we are to teach, and by what in- 
struments we are to teach. We are to teach children, and very 
young children. We are to teach by the means which God 
has put into our hands. These means are not extraordinary, 
they are human intellects and human affections, but though 
the same in each, they are not equally developed in the man 
and in the child. Each must be addressed differently — each 
in reference to his own actual condition, if we expect that each 
should feel and each understand. A child is all sensation, 
therefore materializes, localizes more rapidly than we do ; we 
spiritualize and abstract with more rapidity than a child. There 
are, therefore, different routes to the same common end. The 
ideas of every human being are limited by his experience ; a 
child's are very contracted — ours the reverse. Yet we can only 
build with the materials we have got ; to comprehend new ideas, 
we can only employ the ideas which we have. A child's vocabu- 
lary is even more circumscribed than its ideas, a man's more 
enlarged ; yet through vocabularies only can we come at ideas, 
through words only can we be taught what others feel and un- 
derstand. Change the statement as we may, to this position we 
must come at last. This is the point where all these statements 
must end. Had we the making of the young spirit, we might 
have ordered it differently ; but such it is, and as it is we must 
take it, and manage it as we can. Now let us apply these prin- 
ciples to Scripture teaching. Are the ideas of a great portion 
of the Scriptures such as are familiar to a child % Is the language 
in any analogy with his actual intellectual condition ? In a word, 
will any teacher acquainted with Scripture knowledge and men- 
tal science conscientiously declare, that a child can feel or un- 
derstand either this language, or these ideas % Hence it has 
always appeared to me a perfect contradiction, or a gross degree 
of ignorance, the placing the Bible, the whole Bible, and no- 
thing but the Bible, in the hands of youth. The intentions may 
have been excellent, but there is a total misapprehension of the 
means. It is right it should penetrate, but the best way to make 
it penetrate, is not to drive in the wedge by the broad end first. 



60 Wyse on 'Education Reform. 

Nor is it only that by such a process we communicate no know- 
ledge and no feeling — that for things we give words, and for 
religion its mockery ; this is only omission of good ; and were 
this all, there might be palliation. But this is not all ; positive 
and enduring evil is effected. Children form their associations 
with a rapidity quite marvellous — they form them in despite of 
their teachers, in despite of themselves. A child who meets 
obscurity where he ought to meet light, and pain where he 
ought to find pleasure, recollects the difficulty, and fears the 
pain, in after-life ; and these associations cling, no matter what 
others follow, for ever after to his Scripture reading. Is this 
just, is this moral, is this religious % No teacher, no minister of 
the Gospel, truly such, would, I am convinced, for a moment 
wish to overlay Scripture knowledge with such egr-egious disad- 
vantages. But ought he to risk the chances % Ought he to raise 
a barrier in childhood, which he cannot be certain he will be 
able to remove in after-life % Is he not accountable, by such a 
course, for all the indiffei'ence, and disgust, and ignorance, which 
must necessarily ensue % Is this teaching Gospel truth % Is it 
not rendering such teaching imjn'acticahle 1 

" What, then, is to be done 1 and how is it to be done 1 Fol- 
low the law of God and nature. The Scriptures are to be 
taught — but, to be taught, nature peremptorily declares they 
must be understood. SucJi parts only as can be understood 
should then become the subject of Scripture teaching. There 
must then be selection, consequently exclusion. But the selection 
must be guided by two rules : 1. Perfect adaptation to the capa- 
city of the child. 2. As little variation as possible from the 
order and phraseology of the text. The first implies both note 
and comment, either viva voce from the master, or in print, and 
of the two latter is more accurate, uniform, and steady, there- 
fore, preferable ; the second, the adoption of the very words of 
Scripture, when they are not unintelligible, or to a child inex- 
plicable. Both these rules must, of course, vary in proportion 
to the age and understanding of the pupil. As Education pro- 
ceeds, the sacred volume itself may be intrusted to their study 
and inquiry, but the student will come to its perusal with yar 
different preparation, both of mind and heart, from what he 
would have brought with him under any other process. 

" But religious instruction must still be accompanied by moral. 
The general injunctions of religion should be reduced to their 



Wyse on Education Reform. 61 

particular and local applications. We should be taught not 
merely, that we ought to be religious and moral ; but in what, 
applied to this or that situation, to its several duties and functions, 
religion and morality consists. This most essential branch of 
Education has, of all others, been least attended to. We send 
out our youth into the walks of active life, with a general sense 
of right and wrong ; but the specific interpretation, the right or 
wrong of this or that position, under this or that circumstance, is 
seldom inquired into, never taught. We are told that Educa- 
tion is intended to form us for society, and yet we are actually 
educated, as if we had to pass our whole life in a cell. We are 
told, be just, be generous, be true: but who tells us, be a pa- 
triotic citizen, a paternal landlord, an honest tradesman, an 
attached tenant ; who attempts to point out to us, in what these 
qualities consist ? To talk of the morality of patriotism appears 
almost as absurd to some, as to descant on the beauty of mathe- 
matics ; yet mathematics have their beauty. And shall we say 
that patriotism, the virtue which ought to combine all others, 
should not be virtuous — should not be moral — should have no 
code — no principle — should be left to the shifting of the political 
elements — should be the guess-work creation of the passing 
hour 1 There is a patriotism, indeed, of which the world has 
never wanted bitter proof; a patriotism which has made the 
very name loathsome ; a patriotism, whose beginning, middle, 
and ending is self; which values country in proportion as it can 
sell it, and party in proportion as they can use or betray it ; 
stitched up of puny expedients for a despicable popularity — a 
popularity which its object himself esteems in proportion only 
as he can coin it into power or gold. In the language of such 
patriots, all words change their meaning : tyranny becomes 
liberty, and defeated trafficking, honesty ; and chartered inso- 
lence, courage ; and rapacious profusion, sacrifice ; and idolatry 
to self, devotion to the public ; and rehearsed cant, religion ; and 
ever-shifting change, fidelity to a common cause. All this is of 
the trade — the legerdemain — by which the people in all times, 
from Cataline to Marat, have been cheated by their better selves. 
But, thank God ! there is something better worth living and con- 
tending for than all this. If such were necessarily to be the whole 
game of public life, happy the man who knew only of the game 
or the gamesters from the loopholes of his distant retreat. 
Public life proposes far nobler ends, and I trust, also far surer 

9 



€2 Wyse on Education Reform. 

as well as juster means. ' To read your history in a nation's 
eyes,' is something; to feel that posterity will not reverse the 
award, is more. The approbation which speaks, not in shouts, 
but in ' the still small voice' of honorable men ; that approbation 
which was not bought, which never will be sold, and which can- 
not be taken away ; — such approbation is worth ambition. It is 
associated with the virtues ; it is given by the just, to the good. 
To aim at such — but far more at the virtues by which it is to be' 
attained — no ma,tter whether it shall be attained or not; this is 
the purport of true patriotism. It looks to realities, and not to 
names ; to the ' esse quam videri ;' to serve country and posterity^ 
even though they should never know, by whom they were served. 
True patriotism is, above all things. Truth -, — truth in all things^ 
and at all times, and before all men. It shrinks from falsehoods 
to thousands, as from falsehood to one, nay, infinitely more ; in 
proportion as confidence is bestowed, and detection is difficulty 
it guards not only against all that may betray, but against all that 
might mislead. It is no dealer in pledges which it means to 
break, nor in promises which it cannot keep, nor in professions- 
which it knows to be false. It leaves not its conscience with its 
constituents, nor equivocates with its duty, when beyond their 
reach. It is no parleyer, no casuist between right and wrong,, 
the people and self, yesterday and to-day. It has opinions, but 
they are its own, not the livery of a master, nor the fortunate 
v/atchword of a day — opinions,^ thought on, acted on, a portion of 
its public character, and its moral being, and no more to be torn 
from it, than a portion of life itself, It believes in the good 
sense and right principle of consistency, well assured that it 
would be not less a folly than a crime, to call upon the public to 
rely without giving them steady ground for reliance. The man 
whose opinions of to-day ai'e point blank contradictions to hi& 
opinions of yesterday, has no political identity ; he is a floating 
phantasm — children and dupes may follow, men have to do with 
©ertainties and realities. A good man will change^ when he 
fi^nds himself in the wrong -^ but he who often changes, either 
changes without a necessity, or has a necessity for change. He 
is either wicked, or foolish. In neither case, is he fit to govern 
himself, much less to govern others. True patriotism believes in 
the policy of honesty, in the full and final success of honor. In its 
esteem it is the shortest and safest, as well as the clearest road to 
success. It is a staunch hater of all oppressions, no matter from 



Wyse on Education Reform. 63 

whom, or how they come ; it stands up calmly, but boldly, against 
all encroachments, whether monarchical or oligarchical, upon 
popular rights; but not less is the determined foe of that worse 
and more hnmiliating oppression, which, under color of serving 
the people, uses and abuses the people, for its own ends of power 
and place, and, once attained, flings them back, like broken 
tools, to the next adventurer who follows at his heels. Nor is 
it for the people, against others only, that it strives. It knows 
its duty, and their interests better. It can defend the people 
against themselves, and return them services for revilings. It 
has the courage to obey conscience though it stood singly, and to 
despise dictation with multitudes at its back. It is no flatterer 
of mob or minister. It tells them, equally and openly, their 
faults, though at the peril of turning both from friends into foea. 
Above all, it seeks, not by words only, but by deeds, to propa- 
gate the faith which is in it ; that holy and noble faith which 
binds together, in one harmony, all that is exalted in life — Reli- 
gion — Domesticity — Patriotism — Poetry — sense of the Beauti- 
ful, of the Sacred, and the True. Where this is, there may not 
be much cunning, but there will be no grovelling ; the individual 
is in full possession, at least of himself; he recognises no mas- 
ter, and requires no slave. But it is not in its influence upom 
the individual only, that its important consequences deserve t© 
be considered. It affects the nation. It raises the whole scale 
of public virtue. It gives a loftier measure for public men. It 
strikes at that systematic personality, that pettifogging selfish- 
mess, which sacrifices millions to the individual, centuries to the 
hour ; at that habitual love for the little and the low, which dis- 
graces the noblest cause, and fritters away in expedients the 
most important interests which can engage mankind. No won- 
der, then, that we should so earnestly insist on the paramount 
necessity of early disciplining the mind to such convictions. No 
wonder that we should consider it an essential portion of all 
moral Education. If we are to have a country — if we are to 
love it, as men should love it, not for its sticks and stones, for its 
rocks and rivers, its heaven above, or its earth below; but for 
what it gives — for that air of liberty which we breathe, for those 
institutions which are our bucklers and our swords, for those 
manners, minds, and characters, which make living country to 
man ; then surely are we bound to teach that by which it may 
be made most worthy of our love, and our love most worthy of 



64 Wyse on Education ReforiH. 

it — that by which its intellectual and moral dignity maybe most 
upheld and augmented ; by which public life may be truly made 
a constant exertion for the public good. To teach this, is to 
teach true patriotism ; to teach true patriotism, is to teach the 
very essence of morality ; it is giving the community the best 
assurance we can find for the due exercise of all public duty." 

", But all this will be of little avail without willing and compe- 
tent teachers. If knowledge and virtue depend upon methods, 
and methods again upon the manner in which they are applied, 
still more do both depend upon the individual to whom their 
application is intrusted. The difference between a good and a 
bad school, between an instructed and ignorant pupil, between 
education and no education, is just the difference between a 
good and a bad teacher. Better, far better, there was no edu- 
cation going on at all, than education under the guidance of 
■ignorance or immorality. Not to teach, is only the absence of 
good ; to misteach, is positive evil. Yet such is our perfect 
inconsistency, that this truth, acknowledged in every other depart- 
ment of society, is denied, at least, practically, in this of educa- 
tion. Who thinks of trusting his apprentice to a novice in the 
craft, or the training of his horse to an ignorant horsebreaker ? 
It is miserable imbecility to talk of teaching, much less of edu- 
cation, when we have no assurance that we have teachers or 
educators at all. If it be immaterial whether they be good or 
bad, then also is Education itself immaterial. If otherwise, how 
can we insult common sense and Christian duty, by allowing 
them to teach a single hour, until we have fully ascertained their 
competency. But this cannot be done at once. Perhaps not ; 
but it can be hegun at once : at all events, this can be done — no 
more application of public money — no more building of schools 
— no more boasting of the miracles performed — the growing 
glories of knowledge — the universal diffusion of intellectual and 
moral enlightenment, until it shall be begun. No education, 
where the educators are not good, ought, for a moment, to be 
recognised as such. It is an expensive mockery, but not Edu- 
cation. 

" The first, the very first point then to be placed beyond all 
chance or doubt, in a good system of National Education, the 
only point which can assure either knowledge or virtue, are the 
intellectual and moral qualifications of the teacher. But what 
are these qualifications ? and how ajre they to be ascertained ? 



Wi/se on Education Reform, 65 

If not of the very highest order, they ought always to be such as 
should fully qualify him, especially for the practical portion of 
his profession. He should not merely be intelligent, but moral ; 
not only moral and intelligent, but fully capable of transfusing 
both his knowledge and morality into the minds of others. The 
highest attainments are useless without this power ; they may 
be gold, but it is yet in ingots. He knows not the art of putting 
it into circulation. These are qualities not to be discovered by 
a half hour's examination, much less are they to be taken on 
trust, and least of all on the recommendation of persons disqua- 
lified, by ignorance, and prejudice of situation, sect, or party, 
from judging. If examination competitions are bad in the case 
of professorships, they are worse in that of ordinary teachers. 
They must, except by miracle, be abused ; a far more certain 
and universal guarantee is essential. That can only be had by 
the same process by which it is obtained in other professions, by 
previous special Education. There must be scJiools for teachers, 
before you think of teaching. You must educate your educators, 
before you set about education. It is expensive. But is it neces- 
sary 1 that is the material question. The necessity has been 
long since admitted ; it was recognised, virtually, at least, the 
first hour we talked of Education. But a consideration, not quite 
so clear, is, how and where are you to obtain pupils for these 
establishments % That depends upon the state. Certainly, after 
having degraded to the lowest level one of the highest functions whicJi 
can he intrusted to man, it is natural we should hear these ohjections. 
But the fault is ours, and not theirs. If this were 'the country it 
boasts itself to be, if it were a country in which the public really 
aspired to elevate the human mind, to assign intellectual supe- 
riority its proper station, long since its laws would have regarded 
the profession of teacher, as one in great degree invested with 
paternal and religious rights. If there be many instances in 
which teachers themselves have derogated from this dignified 
position, and converted what ought to have been the most im- 
portant of social duties into a mere trade, it is only the natural 
result of our unwise and niggard legislation, and belongs not to 
the profession, nor to the men. 

" A teacher ought therefore to have attached to his position 
such advantages and consideration, as may naturally tend to ele- 
vate it to its legitimate rank in society. But in concurrence 
with these advantages, he must possess such qualifications as will 



66 Wi/se on Education Reform. 

justify them. He must really make it a profession in the first 
instance, excluding from it all secondary employments which 
might interfere with its character, and the respect which it 
intrinsically has a right to claim ; and in the next, he must, by 
long and assiduous preparation, have rendered himself fully com- 
petent for the dischai'ge of its duties. 

" The Teacher must not only be perfect master of the various 
branches of Education which he is called on to teach, but he 
must also, in addition, be thoroughly acquainted, both theoreti- 
cally and practically, with the art of Education itself. He must 
understand the science of mind, the principles of instruction, 
the best methods, the latest improvements ; and not only must 
he understand them, but he must have so repeatedly exercised 
them, that their practice shall be as familiar as their theory. For 
his moral duties a still more elevated scale will be requisite. He 
must be strongly penetrated with the importance of his sacred 
ti'ust. His religious and moral convictions must be profound — 
he must make himself thoroughly acquainted with the nature of 
the youthful heart, and with the best expedients for its correc- 
tion and improvement ; his rebukes must be tempered by mo- 
desty, patience, evident justice, good sense, and, above all, by 
unwearied kindliness ; abstaining, in every instance at all prac- 
ticable, from punishment, and never allowing himself to be trans- 
ported by passion or harshness. His praise should be simple 
and measured. He must remember that it is not sufficient to 
reward success — he must not dishearten exertion. His manners 
must be grave, but not austere. Above all, he must be constant, 
equable, certain — an inexorable regard to truth in the minutest 
trifle, (if, indeed, any thing be a trifle where truth is concerned,) 
and an honorable elevation above all selfish and interested mo- 
tive, must be his distinguishing characteristics. It is needless to 
say that his private life must be irreproachable. If moral teaching 
be necessary, what teaching is like example ? Unless he be all 
this, he may be a schoolmaster, but he is no true instructor. If 
he be incapable of discharging these duties, and fulfilling these 
obligations, even to the letter, (whatever maybe his talents,) he 
will fail in the high object of his vocation. He may form clever 
and well-instructed men, but men, in the true acceptation of the 
word — never. Such qualities are, indeed, rare, but they ought 
not to be so, nor would they be so, if proper means were 
adopted to insure them. They will not grow of themselveSj 



Wt/sc on Education Reform. 67 

but with proper culture they may be made to grow. This pro- 
per culture ought to be insisted on j if not to be had, it ought to 
be provided. Schools for teachers ought to be the ^rst object 
with whoever undertakes to assure to a class or a community a 
good Education. The nature of the qualifications required, 
points out the nature of the school. 

" The assurance that a candidate has passed through these 
schools, will, of itself, be a far better pledge to the public of his 
competency, than any competition, examination, or public elec- 
tion, be it parochial, clerical, or government commission, or 
whatever other form it may be thought proper to employ. Ad- 
mitting the perfect impartiality of such an ordeal, the conclu- 
sions it leads to are unsatisfactory. It at best proves a propor- 
tionate, but not an absolute qualification. It is little more than 
the expression of the very vague opinion of very incompetent 
judges. Here, on the contrary, is positive study — certain ac- 
quirement. It may be much, or it may be little, but the man 
who submits to it has a vocation : with its importance he is fully 
impressed ; and, if so, it is only reasonable to suppose that he 
has taken adequate pains to fit himself for it. The very cer- 
tainty he has of many others being engaged in the same pursuit 
is a stimulant. As things now are, he may have spent a great 
part of his life, for aught we know, as a horse-jockey : with a? 
little parish intrigue, he will be found to be a marvellous proper 
man. He is too good a fellow not to be a good: schoolmaster. 
He can cast up accounts, teach the catechism, and serve a& 
clerk ; what more is requisite l 

" The high importance of previous qualification necessarily 
implies the necessity of sustaining it, at least, to the same level j 
this is difficult without books, and communication with men en- 
gaged in the same pursuits. EacJi school ought, therefore, to have 
its teachers^ library, and each district its teachers' conferenceSj^ 
where all may meet, at specific periods. Nor should the teacher 
neglect occasional visits to the model or teachers' school of the 
capital, to discuss the interests and advancement of his and their 
common profession, or any similar means, by which he may re- 
fresh his information, and still further augment and improve the 
methods which he has in use. 

" Such a teacher, so prepared, antl so disposed to add on 
every occasion to his means, will be worthy of his high func- 
tions. He may not amass great wealth — he may not reach higk 



68 Wpse on Education Refortn, 

\ 

distinction — but he will give useful members to society — be will 
contribute more eflfectively to reform his age than loud talkers 
and professional patriots, and ultimately find the best of all re- 
wards in the approbation of his own conscience, in the esteem 
of honest and enlightened men, and the proud conviction of 
having rendered essential service to his country, and to hu- 
manity. 

" With untutored passions, feeble or headlong will, with his 
moral habits unformed, his religious opinions mere habits, the 
half-educated, or ill-educa,ted man, will make use of this new 
instrument, instruction, as a new means only of personal and 
perilous gratification ; he will profane knowledge by rendering 
her ministrant to his selfish corruptions ; he will sap society, by 
attacking it where its life chiefly exists, in the seat of its intel- 
lectual and moral power. Nor will these evils be temporary, or 
isolated. There is a principle of attraction in the spiritual 
world, still stronger than in the physical. Such minds soon 
aggregate to them others, and out of such aggregations is public 
opinion formed, and out of public opinion come demagogues, 
ministers, legislatures, governments, in a word, states themselves. 
Well may we then pause, before we go forth to this really awful 
task. Activity may be a great evil, as well as a great good. 
Not how you run, but whither you run, is the question. Whilst we 
boast that we are educating, and thence infer that we are raising 
up bulwarks around our liberties and happiness, we may be lay- 
ing, for aught we know, in certain and regular succession, the 
combustibles only, which, on the very first spark, may be des- 
tined to fling both happiness and liberty into the air. 

" The Physical Education proposed, does not counteract na- 
ture, but follows it. It gives the utmost development to the 
bodily energies, and applies them to the most useful purposes. 
The result of developing the bodily energies is powerful, in the 
first instance, on the health ; in the second, on the intellect and 
morality of the population. The health is secured by removing 
the seeds of disease, or preparing against its attacks. The intel- 
lect and morality are improved by removing all physical causes 
which may interfere with their action, such as disease, feeble- 
nes?, want of order, cleanliness, &c., and by augmenting and 
invigorating the bodily instruments with which both must work, 

" The useful application of these forces is not less important. 
It not only produces a large amount of positive good, the mate- 



W->/se on Education Reform. 69 

rial fruits of well applied labor, but it induces habits of regu- 
larity, industry, and content. Each, .being employed in the 
manner best adapted to his faculties and position, moves easily, 
produces the greatest quantity of advantage to himself and 
others, and can have no motive or tendency to move from it, by 
violent or capricious transition to any other. 

" The advantage of all this to the individual is obvious — is it 
of less advantage to the community ? 

The Intellectual Education suggested, seconds, in an effec- 
tive manner, this physical development, and offers additional 
advantages of its own. It does not limit itself to acquisitions j 
Its object is not knowledge only. It sees every human being 
endowed with intelligence— the more or less is dependent upon 
organization, but still more upon education. It seeks to de- 
velope to the fullest these energies in the first instance, and to 
apply them to the most useful purposes in the second. 

" These habits acquired, these instruments so prepared, it 
applies them not to purposes purely speculative, indifferent, or 
injurious. It uses these powers for the acquisition of know- 
ledge, but the knowledge it proposes for attainment is not 
merely theoretic, but practical — knowledge which gives new 
means, not merely of avoiding numerous evils, affecting both 
his physical and spiritual condition, but means also for indefi- 
nitely raising both in the scale of improvement and enjoyment. 
It teaches him where lie his true interests, how these interests 
may be best attained, and, when attained, how they may be best 
secured ; it gives him the power of self-conduct, and enlarged 
means of doing good ; it furnishes an inexhaustible source of 
true and pure pleasures, and extinguishes his taste for false 
and coarse ones ; in a word, it opens to him a new portion of his 
nature, and immeasurably enhances the value of the other. 
The physical man is of tenfold power in the hands of the in- 
tellectual. 

" The Moral and Religious education proposed in the pre- 
ceding pages, addresses itself directly to this purpose. It re- 
cognises in the will the determining cause of human action, but 
it sees the will itself under the influence of habits, as habits are 
under the influence of feelings and principles. It seeks to se- 
cure both. It insists on the essential impoitance of forming 
early and permanently these habits ; it calls in to its assistance, 
in their formation and direction, the culture of moral and reli- 

10 



70 Wi/se on Education Rtform. 

gious feelings, and the inculcation of a code of religious and 
moral duty ; for both it recurs to the Scriptures, but it renders 
scriptural injunction special, by applying it practically to every 
situation in life. It endeavors to carry the Gospel and its power 
into every condition, to give the moral, the mastery over the in- 
tellectual, as it gave the intellectual the command over the phy- 
sical portion of man. With this, with a wise and firm conscience 
at the head, it trusts implicitly to the government of the indi- 
vidual, all his sensibilities and all his powers, and fears not to 
raise them to the very highest degree of perfection of which 
they are susceptible. It considers that it thus fulfils the true 
end of all education. ' Knowledge is power,' says Bacon. 
Such an education would be power, wisdom, and virtue. 

" What is now the operation of this on society % The two 
great objects to which we have to look for the happiness and 
security of society, are its purity and good order. Which is 
most likely to attain both — this education, or the absence of this 
education ] Let us take two individuals — one educated, the 
other not — and contrast them. By narrowing our vision we 
shall see clearer ; what will be the condition of these individuals 
and their influence on the condition of society % 

" There are few villages in the country which do not present 
us specimens of the uneducated ; we meet him in the gin-shop 
and in the street — he is an idler, a drunkard, a quarreller — we 
hear of him in every riot, he is an aider and abettor in every 
outrage. His family are slovenly, reckless, debased, wretched, 
He is a quarreller, because a drunkard, and he is a drunkard, 
because he is idle. But why is he idle 'I Because he has never felt 
the value of labor — the pleasure of thinking — the joy of a good 
conscience. He has never been habituated to form judgments 
of these things. The powers necessary to form such judgments, 
have been neglected. He has never been taught to examine, to 
inquire, to attend. He has become passive. He feels the pres- 
sure of want brought on by his own habits ; but how does he 
try to remedy it ] All his life he has been taught to spare, as 
much as possible, his own exertions, and to hang, beggar-like, as 
much as possible, on those of others. He is the slave, from 
laziness, of authority. It is not in a sudden emergency he is 
likely to throw it off All his life he has sacrificed, with the 
short-sighted selfishness of ignorance, the future to the present, 
and every interest, public and private, to his own. He is tur- 



Wyse on Education Reform. 71 

bulent, but not independent ; he talks of freedom, and is a slave 
to every man and thing around. But indolence is not a merely- 
passive vice. Better to ' wear out' than to * rust out,' has been 
truly said ; but he who ' rusts out' ' wears out,' too. No greater 
burthen than sloth ; no greater consumer of the spirit and body 
of man, than doing nothing, and having nothing to do. Every 
day spent in inactivity, renders action more difficult ; every hour 
which does not add, steals away some instrument of virtue and 
happiness, and leaves the sluggard more at the mercy of those 
visitations of sickness or want to which even the industrious are 
exposed. Nor is this all. Omission of duty, soon becomes 
commission of crime. Painful reflections now beset him. They 
are sought to be extinguished, but not by reform. Conscience 
drives him to fresh vice. This goes on for a time — but health, 
means, companions, must at last fail. Then it is that he sees, 
for the first time, how bootlessly he has squandered away the 
healthy morning-tide, the woi-king hours of life. Whither is he 
to rush for rescue from these encompassing evils ? The Gospel 
he never understood — and therefore never practised. His reli- 
gion is an hypocrisy, or a superstition. It affords him now 
no direction in his errors, no consolation in his afflictions. 
He finds in it neither warmth nor light. The religion he 
learnt never penetrated to the spirit ; it was a tinkling cym- 
bal — a jai-gon of meaningless and profitless words. But 
crime, which had long been ripe in thought, is at last on the 
point of bursting into act. He is at last ready for every despe- 
rate attempt. Education has been held up as the great principle 
of all modern restlessness and disorder. Is this the case ? Let 
facts answer. Here are men uneducated enough, ignorant 
enough, to produce the most perfect quiet, if ignorance and ab- 
sence of education could produce it. Yet is it from materials 
like these you are to expect the tranquillity and prosperity of a 
great nation ? Is it in the nature of things, that out of elements 
so utterly evil, peace and happiness should emanate % Private 
vice has but to make a few steps, and a few proselytes, and it 
becomes public corruption ; individual discontent wants only 
time and circumstance to spread out into general disorder. 

" But let us now turn a little to the reverse of this picture. 
Let us see what a good, sound, sufficient, and appropriate educa- 
tion, would produce. Let us take a pupil from one of these 
schools, educated, as much as possible, on the system we have 



72 Wi/se on Education Reform. 

recommended. Let us suppose that he has been accustomed, 
from his childhood up, to attend to the common objects around 
him — to form clear conceptions of each— to combine them con- 
sistently — -to compare and weigh them, and never to take any 
thing for granted, never to adopt before he has first proved. Let 
us add to this, habits of labor and dexterity — whatever can give 
knowledge and confidence in his physical powers, and whatever 
can discipline him, by long practice and judicious instruction, to 
sound and national morality. Then set him abroad in the world, 
and see how he will act with this preparation, in his domestic 
and public capacity. He will be master of all his faculties — 
consequently, can wield them with suppleness to all the ordi- 
nary purposes of life. He will fully comprehend all the objects 
around him with which he ought to be familiar, and will thus 
be enabled to apply his knowledge with certainty and ease. He 
will not be discontented, because he will perfectly conceive how 
much his own happiness depends upon himself. He will under- 
stand that true independence is the child of good conduct, and 
that good character is in itself fortune. He will not be found 
trusting indolently to others for success : he will carve out that 
success himself He will not be disappointed by failures, which 
reflection must teach him to be inevitable, and experience has 
taught him to be remediable. 

" Moral Education has given him energy, has given him ' Will ;' 
and he not only exercises over himself all due control, but he 
fears not to interpose, in the enlightened spirit of true justice, 
between the public, and the corruptions and violence of indivi- 
duals. He is no intriguer with the overseer ; no weak protector 
of the insolent pauper ; no trafficker for personal profit, in any 
one sense, on the rights or property of the public. If not rich 
he is comfortable ; he knows the sweets of ' eating his own 
bread,' and ' walking up his own stairs.' Hence, you will not 
find the children of such a family wandering lazily from street 
to street, the associates of the unprincipled, the already mature 
pupils of infamy and crime. The 'lessons on Education' which 
the parents had received, are visible in the virtue and intelligence 
of their children. They know by what early discipline these 
tender beings may be preserved untainted to society ; they know 
what arts they must use, to prepare them for the same useful 
and happy race, which they are now running themselves : they 
are deeply impressed with the importance of these obligations ; 



Wi/se on EducafAon Reform. 73 

they feel fully both the nature and necessity of the trust. Thus, 
already have they preluded, by giving them early habits of ' ac- 
tivity,' 'attention,' ' order,' ' truth,' ' religious feeling,' to the edu- 
cation of the Infant and Primary school, and sown the seeds of 
a new and better generation than that, which is now hastening 
away. Nor is it easy to say, to what degree of social ameliora- 
tion, this early maternal culture, steadily and judiciously pur- 
sued, in all ranks of life, will ultimately lead. Each succeeding 
age will more and more facilitate, by such preliminary attention, 
the intellectual and moral development of the public school, and 
thus lay a much surer and broader foundation for the entire 
superstructure of Education. 

" But he has other duties to perform. He is a citizen. For 
these duties, he is also prepared. He is obedient to the laws, 
but his obedience is not founded upon ignorance. Short, in- 
deed, and precarious, is the submission of a fool — at the mercy 
of every sophism of passion or wickedness, which may choose 
to seduce, or assail it. He knows his rights, but he also knows 
his duties, and his interests. He has not studied the constitu- 
tion and legislation of his country, elementary as the study may 
have been, merely to rail at it. The structure of society, the 
principles of social happiness, are familiar to him. He sees the 
value, the necessity, of different grades, for each, and for all. 
He does not look with envy, but neither with servility, upon the 
higher orders of society : he respects them, but he respects him- 
self more ; he has learnt, in all things, and at all times, 

' to venerate hiniself a man,' 

and to bless Heaven, every morning, on his knees, that he was 
born in such a country, and in the midst of the light and liberty 
of such an age. He is ready, at any risk of life or fortune — (it 
was a part of his ' moi'al and religious education') — to repel real 
aggression upon his chartered franchises ; he has been too well 
taught to appreciate the value of the institutions he enjoys, to 
bear tamely a diminution of the blessing ; but he is not for that 
less sensible of the importance of order and tranquillity, less alive 
to the necessity of maintaining general confidence between all 
orders, less convinced that out of such alone can proceed public 
security, and that without public security there is no stimulant 
for private exertion, or hope for private good. He has been 



74 Wif'se on Education Reform. 

taught (in his elementary lessons on ' economics' and ' legisla- 
tion') the nature of the reciprocal position of governor and go- 
verned, of master and laborer, of buyer and seller; whilst he 
boldly insists that governTTient should do all it can, he knows 
well that government cannot do every thing ; that each man must 
add his contribution ; that it is his duty, if it were not his interest, 
to do so ; that the self-guidance, and self-control, of the individual 
are, after all, the great sources of the happiness and prosperity 
of the commonwealth at large." 

We have brought up, iiifcopious extracts, the author's main 
intent so far ; and have refrained from breaking their con- 
nexion unnecessarily, because they will thus explain them- 
selves more clearly than we could point them out by obser- 
vation. One principal object, it will be seen, is that of effect- 
ing a thorough reform in popular ediicatlon. He insists, and 
with great propriety, that verbiage and mere abstract learning- 
is of little avail to the great purposes of ordinary life. He 
wishes to see physical, intellectual, and moral education, 
forming the three integral parts of a general system, so that 
the mind may be healthy together with the body, and the 
moral and religious principles may be the capital of the so- 
cial column. 

In order to effect so important a result, he is anxious that 
the young and ardent soul shall not be wantonly degraded, 
and rendered callous by frequent and unworthy punishments. 
He is of the humane and sagacious opinion, that prevention 
is better than cure, and in accordance thereto, would have 
the teacher one who has sagacity enough to trace the springs 
of action in his pupils, patience to watch them, skill to direct 
them, and industry to cultivate them. These are important 
requisites, seldom found, but all essential : and in these also 
he wishes to effect a reform. He begins right to do this. Let 
schools for teachers be instituted, that they may know how to 
communicate k?iowledge to others. Let them remain during 
a noviciate, and go through a probation. Let none but such 
as shall be found duly qualified have the charge of a school, 
and then let every energy be used to elevate the character of 
the office to its proper level. 

This last is indeed an important requisite. How is the 



Wi/se on Education Reform. 75 

child to treat with respect the teacher whom he sees subjected 
to contumely by his parents or by the world ? How shall the 
teacher enforce his instructions where he cannot command 
respect? And how shall persons worthy of respect be found 
for the office, who know, beforehand, the unworthy treatment 
to be expected? Our author reminds us that the teacher 
should be much with his pupils at other seasons besides the 
usual hours of study. This is true ; but it pre-supposes a 
decent and honorable maintenance for him, and a security 
from the uncertainties of declining years. More than this 
would be extravagance, less than this would be injustice; but, 
so provided, the faculties and attainments of the teacher 
should be devoted to the advancement of the pupils in wisdom 
and goodness, " in season and out of season ;" and it will ever 
be found that friendly and familiar colloquy, and information 
given incidentally in discourse, will not only be the most 
lasting in recollection, and most clear to the understanding, 
but may be made subservient to the main plan of conduct in 
pursuing a system of education. 

Hitherto, Mr. Wyse has touched but very slightly upon 
one particular aid to popular education, upon which however 
he is in earnest, and concerning which he treats more at large 
in a part of his work which we shall note hereafter. We 
allude to school and village libraries ; and next to a good plan 
of education and a competent teacher, we do assuredly believe 
this to be the most efficient assistant. It answers so many 
useful purposes, it furthers the great end of education in so 
many ways, that it mxay well deserve to have a section to itself.' 
This will, perhaps, be most appropriate, after we have attend- 
ed to what Mr. Wyse says on the subject. We shall, there- 
fore, defer it until then, premising that we consider it to be the 
fourth integral branch of popular education. 



The second branch of Mr. Wyse's book, commences with 
the principle, that "national education should be universal." 

" There are four distinct opinions on this question : 
1. Those who think that education is not necessary or useful 
to certain classes, the poor, &c. — the ordinary religious instruc- 



76 Wyse 07i Education Reform. 

tion, and the example of their superiors, in their opinion, 
suffice. 

2. Those who think education, in the abstract, useful, but 
dangerous, at certain periods, and to certain bodies or individuals, 

3. Those who think education so necessary and useful, that 
it ougJit to be given to all, and to the utonost possible extent. 

4. Those who think, that not only should education be 
given, but that it can no longer be loithheld. 

He then proceeds to examine the first of these positions, 
but as his observations are altogether local, and have re- 
ference to England, Scotland and Ireland, we pass them by 
for the present, although abounding in sound argument. 
But the following exception is of more general application, 
and deserves to be seriously considered. 

" The great majority of the country (England) is favorable to 
the utmost extension of education amongst the Upper and Mid- 
dle classes. Not so when there is question of the education of 
the Lower. Here every shade of opinion is observable, from 
those who would give them the most unlimited share of infor- 
mation, to those who would give them none at all. The objec- 
tions to the education of the People appear formidable when 
thus taken in mass; when reduced separately to their true 
dimensions, their importance vanishes. They may be classed 
under the five following heads : 

1. The lower classes are disqualified, by their position, 
from acquiring knowledge. 

2. They have not sufficient time for acquiring it. 

3. They have no use for it, when acquired. 

4. It is not only of no utility, but of positive injury, to the 
lower classes. 

5. It is not only of injury to the lower classes, but to the 
other classes of the state. 

1. They are disqualified hy their 'position. To make and 
keep -the people stupid, and then maintain, because they ere 
stupid, they should not be taught, is about as rational a position 
as to maintain, because we have made men slaves, we ought not 
now to make them free. Had such argument been listened to, 
there would not, at this moment, be a free nation on the earth y 
had such reasoning been applied to instruction, thei'e would 



Wi/se 071 Education Reform. 77 

scarcely be an enlightened one. At one period or other in the 
history of every nation such objections have been urged. But 
the enjoyment of freedom and of knowledge fortunately fit for 
the proper exercise of both. Men do not walk, but by trying to 
walk. A nation, no more than an individual, is to be instructed 
by theory. If the laborer were to be left in ignorance until he 
should become sufficiently enlightened to desire knowledge, he 
would probably die as he had lived, and generations would perish 
like individuals. Pushed to its extreme point, it would leave 
the savage in the forest, and the slave in the mine ; the man of 
the nineteenth century would be little better than the uncivilized 
cotemporary of the Egberts and Harolds. And if we are not 
to push it to this extreme, I should like to know at what point 
we are to stop. Where is the precise boundary between enough 
and too much ? Is it a matter of hours or acres — of this latitude 
or that — of taxes or governments ? a matter of accident, and not 
determinable by the natural capabilities of the human mind 1 It 
may be difficult, indeed, to bring grown-up men to such disci- 
pline — their minds are often as callous as their hands ; but the 
* boy,' physically and mentally, is yet tender ; and with boys, 
and not with grown-up men, has education to do. The disquali- 
fication asserted, is mere assumption. -Disqualified for what? 
It is not proposed to teach the laborer Latin and Greek, He is 
not to be surfeited with the useless and difficult. Nothing but 
what is easy to any human being, nothing but what is useful to 
every human being, is to be his lesson. He is to be made, 
not a had scholar, but a good lahorer. It is surely no great 
task, to do by rule, what one must otherwise do at random ; it 
is no great draw upon mental exertion to learn the simplest 
and most certain processes of practising one's own trade ; of 
giving greater value to one's own industry ; of putting to 
greater profit one's own economy. To enable him to do 
this, and to do it promptly and well, is the object of intel- 
lectual training. But intellectual training, though important, is 
not the main object of education. The main object is moral 
training. Is the laborer disqualified, by his position, for this % 
Is he too stupid to comprehend the distinctions between vice and 
virtue, the nature of his private and public duties, the import- 
ance of exertion, the happiness of good conduct, the respecta- 
bility of honesty and principle % If so, why does he go to church % 
The same obtuseness which disqualifies the boy for the school, 

11 



78 Wyse on Education Reform. 

must equally disqualify the man for the sermon. If the daily 
teacher cannot succeed in inculcating these doctrines and enfor- 
cing these habits, what can be hoped from the weekly preacher % 
The argument, in consistency, ought to abandon him solely to 
himself. But what would be the result of such abandonment % 
The mind and jnental faculties, from want of exercise and nou- 
rishment, would fall asleep. Every day he would more and 
more degenerate ; more and more approximate to the beast j 
more and more appear disqualified by his position for instruc- 
tion. But from what would all this have proceeded ] From any 
inherent incapacity in the laborer himself? No; but from the 
absurd belief that such incapacity originally existed. We first 
take every pains to create the defect, and then complain that it 
is incurable ! 

2. " They have not sufficient time. — What is the time which a 
child requires for labor, what for instruction 1 This depends on 
circumstances. A child, from the age of six to ten, cannot be 
employed on field labor fifteen hours per day. His health would 
suffer, and the work would be ill done. Judicious arrangement 
is necessary, not only to economize the animal machine, and thus 
preserve it for future exertion, but also for the better manage- 
ment and apportioning of the work itself: both are materially 
served by occasional relaxation. The laborer works harder, 
though for a shorter time ; the work is better and more quickly 
done. But what is to be done with these hours of relaxation ] 
hov/ are they to be employed % Why not at school 1 But school 
is not relaxation. Why not % it depends solely upon the manner 
of conducting the school. Where the school is well conducted, 
it is, as it ought to be, a place of pleasure, and not of pain. But 
these surplus hours, spared from labor, will not be suflScient for 
instruction. Why not ? the same principle which regulates the 
application to labor should regulate the application to instruction. 
Two hours per day have been found sufficient, when properly 
employed, in Switzerland. Where is the child who, out of fif- 
teen hours per day, has not two hours to spare ? 

3. " They have no use for instruction. — This depends upon the 
nature of the instruction. If it be not calculated to improve the 
condition to which society destines them, if it be inapplicable to- 
their every day wants, if it does not give them greater skill and 
steadiness in the management of their domestic concerns, if it 
does not better qualify them for the discharge of their private and 



Wyse on Education Reform. 79 

public duties, if it does not infuse a more enlightened and active 
spirit of religion and morality, if it does not develope usefully 
their understanding and their feelings ; in fine, if it be an educa- 
tion totally unfit for the people, it may certainly be admitted, 
that of such education the people can have no earthly use. But 
such, surely, is not our education. The very first essential of 
the education for w^hich we are contending is not its extent, nor 
its elevation, nor the number of things learned, nor their seeming 
importance, nor their facility — though all this be worth attend- 
ing to — but, above all things, and in all things, its applicability. 
Let the peasant have the peasant's education ; and the gentleman 
the gentleman's : that is, in plain phrase, an education which will 
teach each to do better what they otherwise may do ill, or, at 
least, what they cannot do so well without, as with it. To say that 
such an education is of 'no use' is a contradiction in terms. 
Whether such an education can he given, is another question. 
May not this apparent impracticability arise, not from the nature 
of education itself, but from our want of knowledge, our want of 
means, our want of exertion in conducting education ] Have 
we examined what other countries have done ] Have we ascer- 
tained bow other countries have succeeded ] Is there any reason 
why we should not succeed also ] Their habits are not ours- 
True ; but it has not been shown that the difference between us 
is so radical as to preclude us from applying, to the instruction of 
our laborers, expedients which have been applied with such ad- 
mirable results to theirs ] Until such assertion can satisfactorily 
be maintained, we are not entitled to assume that education is 
* of no use' to the people. 

" But, even were these results less conspicuous, we should 
pause before we doom so large a portion of our species to so 
great a privation as that of moral and mental light ! The Peo- 
ple, even in the rudest societies, are surely something more than 
a mere animated piece of mechanism. They are something 
more than a mere flesh and blood machinery, for the purpose of 
elaborating so much surplus gratification for the exorbitant de- 
sires of the few. Are they, then, to be limited irredeemably 
and exclusively to mere bodily operations % Is the spirit to be 
starved in the midst of matter and material processes ? Is the 
mammonite philosophy of the age to allow them no place at the 
intellectual banquet ? Why debar that immortal nature, which 
they possess in common with the proudest in the land, from its 



80 Wyst on 'Education Reform. 

natural pasture ] Why incapacitate the peasant from filling up, 
with mental pleasures, the interval, at least, of his bodily exer- 
tions ? If such be the inheritance to which they are inevitably 
doomed, Heaven has given its glorious light to few. But surely 
this is a strange blasphemy ! God is the Father of «Z^ his crea- 
tures : the Giver oi good gifts has given nothing in vain. 

" As long, then, as education can give pleasure, without injury 
to the individual or to the public — as long as it innocently en- 
hances enjoyment, or diminishes pain — it is not a matter of in- 
difference ; it is a substantial benefit— it is of use. The pains 
of the laboring classes are already too many, their compensations 
too few, to justify the slightest unnecessary interference with so 
scanty a stock of happiness. Strong, indeed, must be the case, 
imminent the danger, evident the injury, which can thus autho- 
rize us to take up the square and balance. Is this the case with 
Education 1 Do these evils and dangers march in its train ? 

4. " Education is of injury to the lower orders. — It distracts 
the laborer, it is alleged, from his manual pursuits — it gives him 
a distaste for labor, a presumptuous opinion of his acquirements, 
an erroneous estimate of his power, and of society — it renders 
him discontented with his condition — indolent, envious, reckless, 
vicious. Were such the results of Education, little doubt could 
be entertained of its pernicious and perilous tendency. But 
are they not rather the results of its abuses or defects 1 Do they 
even exist 1 If they do, may they not arise from sources totally 
different from those stated % Is it just, until these points be as- 
certained, to sit down, and, with our arms crossed, as if each 
had been fully proved, to anathematize Education % 

" The fact is, all these evils arise, as has been already said, 
not from the gift, but from its privation ; not from its qualities, 
but from deficiency in these qualities. Why does the laborer 
form an erroneous estimate of himself, and of society ] Not 
because he knows something of either, but because he does not 
know enough ; not because he has been educated, but because 
he has not heen properly educated. 

" Create prohibitions, and you create distinctions, and with 
distinctions presumption. You produce the very evil you wish 
to suppress, or you produce nothing — your laws are either bad, 
or ineffectual. The wiser course would be, to consult first with 
human nature, and then to legislate under her inspiration and 
inspection. Make Education as universal as the light, as neces- 



Wyse on Education Reform. 81 

sary as the air ; make it the common enjoyment of every human 
being, and we shall then hear nothing of ' distinction.' Let 
there be no privileges, and there will be no presumption. 

" If all laborers be instructed, the laborer will cease to be 
presumptuous. If the laborer be not presumptuous, he will 
soon cease to be ' discontented.'' Continue to raise the other 
classes in proportion as you raise his, and you will keep all so- 
ciety in its original relative position. The whole shell will swell 
out simultaneously. There will be no jagged prominences. No 
one body will be elevated into an unjust pre-eminence over 
others ; but the entire mind, character, resources of the country 
will be enlarged. The laborer will see others before him still, 
higher places filled, competition as active as ever, competitors 
as superior to their predecessors as he is to his. If a momen- 
tary vanity should urge him to aim at situations beyond his pow- 
ers, experience will soon correct the illusion. Where this ex- 
perience is general, it is just as probable that the merchant, who 
has passed through an university, will throw by his ledger in dis- 
gust, because he cannot be a peer, as that the laborer and opera- 
tive, who have passed through the ' town' or ' country' school, 
will infallibly strike, because they cannot attain the station of a 
merchant. If Education has any thing to do with the opinions 
or conduct of either, it is only on the side of good ; but the fact 
is, necessity, iron necessity, is the great reconciler in the matter. 
The tide, which the sudden force of Education carries towards 
certain professions, will, at first, flow rapidly ; but as soon as 
these professions shall be fully supplied, it will gradually return 
to its accustomed bed, and society be again restored to its equi- 
librium. Neither is there any thing in the condition of the 
laborer, more taxing to human exertion, more detracting from 
honorable self-respect, than any other occupation ; on the con- 
trary, agriculture, if we reason from realities, and not preju- 
dices, is the truly noble occupation of life. The laborer finds 
in his habits another principle of adhesion ; the impulsion which 
could dislocate such a class must uproot the whole of his nature, 
cut off all associations, break down existing connexions, and 
produce a revolution in comparison to which changes of consti- 
tutions, and cashiering of sovereigns, are mere trifles. 

" But if the tendency of popular instruction, it may perti- 
nently be asked, be to disturb and excite the people, why allow 
their children to read the Gospel ] Of all instruction, the Gos- 



82 Wyse on Education Reform. 

pel, under certain points of view, is the most likely to render 
them discontented with their situation. In no one book is the 
original equality of man more strongly inculcated, contempt for 
the rich more prominently put forward, feelings leading to the 
most extended republicanism every where more discoverable. 
The ' powers of this world' are as dross before the ' children 
of light ;' it is to be despised of the earth, to ' the poor in spi- 
rit,' to ' fishermen,' to ' publicans,' and not to the Prince, nor 
to the High Priest, nor to the Doctor of the law, that the secrets 
of the kingdom of God are confided. The very essence of early 
Christian government, in conformity with the Gospel spirit, 
was ' equality and fraternity;' the first professors formed, in the 
heart of a gigantic despotism, a free, if not an independent state. 
But do we therefore prohibit the Gospel % Do we fear to place 
it in the hand of our peasantry % Assuredly not. There are 
doctrines in the same sacred pages, which constitute these very 
safeguards. If the Gospel be read, as it ought to be, with due 
attention to these, danger need not be apprehended. True it is, 
that the peasant can scarcely guide that attention himself; but 
there are others who can. We therefore call them in to assist 
him ; but this assistance once given, we are no longer doubtful 
of the results. Here is instruction, here is enlightenment, from 
which we expect the most salutary fruits. Why, then, do we 
shrink from education ? What is it, but another modification of 
the same process % If, with a judicious instructor. Gospel teach- 
ing does not infuse dissatisfaction, why, with similar precautions, 
should any other branch of education 1 

" That idleness should follow from discontent, is quite natu- 
ral ; that increase of crime should follow from both, is not less 
so ; but that both necessarily proceed from, or are unchecked 
by education, is an assumption absolutely gratuitous. If the 
positions in the preceding pages be just, it will be difiicult to 
show any connexion between education and vice — certainly 
none between good education and vice. It is just as impossible 
it should exist, as between true religion and vice. It may be 
true, indeed, that neither interpose as strong barriers as could 
be desired ; but, because they do not effect as much as we desire, 
it is no proof that they effect notJdng, The fair way to judge 
both would be, to see what the same nation, religious and irreli- 
gious, educated and uneducated, but in other respects, as nearly 
as possible, under the same circumstances, would produce ; I 



Wyse on Education Reform. 83 

say under the same circumstances, because, reasoning of their 
operation under different, is reasoning of different operations. 
This would, at once, enable us to ascertain what really pro- 
ceeded from education, and what did not ; it would point out 
what other producing causes intervened, the amount and extent 
of their several actions, and to which the aggregate effect was 
mainly to be set down. Until this can be done, we have scarcely 
a right to take a general vague fact, concomitant with, or exist- 
ing, perhaps, in despite of education, as the consequence of edu- 
cation. It would be just as reasonable to suppose, in an alge- 
braic equation, that a quantity, absorbed by a greater, was the 
chief producing cause of a result ; yet, in the practical part of 
the work, we shall see how frequently this has been done. The 
presumed augmentation of crime in Engiand has been held forth 
as a direct argument, not only against education in England, not 
only against education as it now exists, but against education 
elsewhere, against education generally, wherever and whenever 
applied to the People. On inquiring more minutely and more 
extensively, we shall be led to very different conclusions. Not 
only have erroneous deductions from facts been hazarded, but 
the facts themselves been misstated. Were both otherwise, it 
would still be difficult to deny that Education, though inefficient, 
had not exercised a considerable resistance. This resistance is 
so much detracted from the force of vice ; its diminution, or re- 
moval, would be so much added. If the resistance be not com- 
mensurate to what it has to resist, the fault is ours, and not that 
of our instrument. By many of our habits and institutions we 
add new energies to vice, but abstain, at the same time, from 
proportionally strengthening and improving education.* 

* The more we reflect on the nature of Education and Crime, the more we 
shall be convinced that there is no true eradicator of crime, but Education. 
Severe penal codes, active police, poor laws on the most liberal scale, are all 
substitutes and palliatives. The eye of the ruler is not all-seeing : the most 
active executive cannot be at all times, and in all placesj^ with its people. To 
check crime, we must check the disposition to crime : to prevent act, we must 
generate an omnipresent control over thought, set up the man in watch over 
himself, and make conscience the universal keeper. 

This is not attainable by mere Punishment, From the extreme difficulty of 
graduating and applying it (its intensity depending as much on the individual 
as on the punishment itself;) from the uncertainty of its application even when 
well graduated (the innocent suffering for the guilty, and thus inflicting a 
double injury on society;) from its inefiiciency in attacking innumerable forms 



84 Wyse on Education Reform. 

" To him who admits the preceding positions, it will scarcely 
be necessary to proceed farther. If the education of the laborer 
be of no injury to the laborer himself, it can surely be of none to 

of vice (which cannot, it is true, without producing still greater injury, be sub- 
jected to legislation, but which are not less amongst the most active principles 
of depravity and disorder;) — Punishment, even in its most preventive form, 
has not yet materially reduced, and it is very doubtful whether it ever will re- 
duce, the large sum of moral evil under which society groans. In its present state, 
it is infected with abuses, which render it quite as much the teacher of new vices 
to the young, as the reformer of old vices in the old. Vigilance police affects 
more the preventive and precautionary character ; but it is still, at best, much 
more the application of a physical than of moral power, and demands sacrifices 
much too large for any blessing. It interferes with the rights and comforts of 
the well conducted, on the plea of defence against the aggressions of the bad. 
The fact is, we commit two radical mistakes; we allow nothing for the influ- 
ence of mental habits on crime, or of education on mental habits. Crime is 
not abrupt impulse, nor inexplicable instinct. In some rare cases, it may be 
organization ; but in the vast majority of instances it is the exhibition, in act, 
of long indulged desires, settled by indulgence into passions. Where organi- 
zation is the cause of crime, punishment, of course, is cruel and absurd : to 
punish a lunat c, is a sort of lunacy itself; it is raging against an irresponsi- 
ble agent. Many of the most marked atrocities of all times may rank in this 
category. Crime, in such cases, is disease; a monomania which the hand of 
justice is called on, not to chastise, but to cure. The works of Pinel, Georget, 
De la Broussais, Spurzheim, on the Continent; at home, those of ConoUy, 
Barrow, Combe ; have placed this matter beyond doubt. But if the Penal law 
be ineffectual, not so is Education, [f the monomaniac is not to be punished, 
it does not follow that the monomania may not, by timely and proper attention, 
be mitigated or prevented. Much of this seeming organization is of gradual 
growth. It lies for a long time in germ. In the child it is a predisposition. A 
" folic raisonnante," as Pinel calls it, if unchecked, will soon soon run into an 
" irresponsible mania." No one, as Locke observes, is altogether exempt from 
such tendencies. The influence of circumstance and things, in calling them 
thus into action, is immense. 

Education can wield mental habits as it pleases. A greater proof cannot be 
given, than the very objection urged against it ; than the present state of Eng- 
land itself Crime, it is stated, has not materially decreased ; juvenile crime is 
now more than ever notorious. The innumerable instances of thieving, shop- 
lifting, profligacy, drunkenness, amongst children of from three to ten years 
old, given by Wilderspin and others, leave little doubt upon the subject. All 
this co-exists with Education, but an education which touches them not, an 
education which passes them by. Their education is of a different complexion. 
Bad instruction at home, bad examples of bad parents, or of bad managers for 
bad parents, wicked associates of all ages, and in all crimes, abroad, — these are 
their teachers. Where such is the preparation, all other education usually comes 
too late. It does not take up the child of nature, but the child of man — diseased 
in heart and head. The evils, which are sure to follow, are set down to educa- 
tion, and not to that which prevents education from working The stream must 



Wyse on Education Reform. 85 

the other orders. It is on this, indeed, that the anti-education- 
ists build their chief ebjection. But they argue in a vicious cir- 
cle. They first contend that because it is injurious to the other 
orders, it must be injurious to the laborer ; and then, because it 
is of injury to the laborer, it must be of injury to the other orders. 
The progress of popular Education is not abrupt, neither are 
the effects of its progress injurious to the other orders. Neces- 
sity on one side, and the natural tendencies of knowledge itself 

be taken higher up. It is mvich easier to guard, than to rescue. It is some con- 
solation to find that this can be done ; that if these young spirits are so easy to 
be perverted, they are not less easy to be protected from perversion. Infant 
schools have produced, and are producing, not miracles, but the natural results 
of good means. In the establishments of Mr. Wilderspin, there is an almost 
total exemption from the very vices which have just been described. Crimes 
against the person gradually diminish with the advance of civilization ; crimes 
against property are often found, comparatively, to increase. This is supposed 
inevitable. The supposition is hasty. There is no reason why one class of 
vices should not be repressed, as well as another. In Mr. Wilderspin's schools, 
dishonesty and falsehood are quite as rare as violence and inhumanity; the out- 
door education is fully overcome. Nor is its influence limited to the rising 
generation. The child reforms the parent. Instances the most striking of this 
salutary power may be found in the Report of the Edinburgh Infant School 
Society, 18th of May, 1832, and especially in the Appendix which accompanies 
it; in Wilderspin's Infant System. 

" But early education will prove inadequate without early occupation. The 
idleness which often svicceeds application, on leaving school, is of all others the 
most dangerous. Evil society is always ready to seize upon the idler. The 
indulgence of a few weeks scatters the discipline of years. The state should 
not quit its guardianship at this most critical period. It should, on mere policy 
and economy, continue its education. A part of this is useful employment. It 
should protect society against idle children, if it does not wish to have to con- 
tend against reckless and desperate men. 

" If Infant schools, and constant occupation, be good preventives of crime, 
Reform schools, on a good system, are not less excellent, both as preventives 
and correctives. The impression which the company of adult criminals pro- 
duces, even upon adults, is most powerful; what must it then be upon an age 
in which the propensity to imitation is tenfold stronger 1 A better classifica- 
tion in prisons in some degree remedies this, but it can scarcely ever be so pre- 
cise as to secure against all its evils. A boy may be a man in crime, though a 
child in years. Here age, and even delinquency, aiford insuflicient data for 
separation. We want something more. The principle upon which prisons 
are chiefly permissible, is their power of reclaiming. If they do not reform, 
they do little. For this, the^^^s^ indications of vice should be attacked, and not 
allowed to consolidate, by repetition, into character. The true remedy, there- 
fore, is not so much chastisement, as habits. But habits are the work of train- 
ing. If, then, they have been neglected, they must be formed ; if lost, they 
must be renewed. This is to be attained by the establishment of ' Reform 
houses,' forming the connecting link between Schools and Prisons." 

12 



86 Wyse on Education Reform. 

on the other, guard against these consequences. A class of labor- 
ers, or operatives, like a single laborer and operative, as soon as 
they find out that all the world read and write, and that men must 
do something beside reading and writing to earn their livelihood, 
will feel little inclination to sacrifice their livelihood to reading 
and writing. A workman is not less inclined to manage a steam- 
engine, nor a farmer to conduct the succession of his crops, be- 
cause he knows something o^ the principle upon which he prac- 
tises. On the contrary, the conversion of a mechanical into a 
rational agent greatly lightens even the mechanical labor. But 
the great fallacy of all this is, that there is no fair consideration 
of the whole question. The accounts are not balanced, there is 
no per contra, not a word of the evils of ignorance, as a set-off 
against the evils of knowledge. It is taken for granted, that an 
ignorant population must necessarily be a submissive one ; that 
stupidity and moral order go hand in hand. The whole expe- 
rience of history protests against this monstrous assertion ; but 
were it as true as it is false, dearly indeed would such brute sub- 
mission be purchased. What would become of all the arts of 
life ? Who would most suffer by their diminution, or restric- 
tion ? Is the upper class less interested in their preservation 
and advancement than the lower ] Assuredly not ; and yet we 
attempt to reconcile this undoubted fact with our hostility to 
popular instruction. Do we not know, that the wider and more 
numerous the chances of improvement, the greater likelihood of 
improvement itself; and that every restriction upon moral or 
mental culture is a direct restriction of these chances ? We can- 
not tell, ' a priori,' who are to be the luminaries or the block- 
heads, any more than we can tell who are to be the future bene- 
factors or criminals, of the country. We are not justified in 
dooming, heforehand, any individual, much less any class, to ine- 
vitable ignorance. 

"But if the dangers apprehended were at all probable, still 
should such dangers be fearlessly encountered. Is the state, so 
anxiously sought to be preserved, a happy or a wholesome one] 
Is it not a state of constant social malady ? If our public policy 
be only to prolong this tottering existence, miserable indeed is 
all its boasted art. It cures us of some evils, to give us others ; 
it suspends anarchy, but fears to make us free ; it multiplies 
means, but spends men, things, and time, at downright loss, 
^uch a policy does not so much defer dissolution, as make us 



Wt/sc Oft Education Reform. 87 

feel it beforehand : our ministers, instead of governors, become 
' gardes-malades ;' our whole effort is, not that we may live, but 
that we may not die. But of what use is it, to make corpses 
walk ? what we want is living, active men. If the frame of our 
society be thus rickety, the sooner we are compelled to break it 
up, the better. If our lower orders, the moment they read and 
write, are to dash all our institutions to pieces, all that still re- 
mains in our power is, to see tliat they begin their mob-work in 
a manner to themselves, and to their country, the least injurious. 
Under such circumstances, it is idle to dispute of more or less ; 
unless we extinguish Education altogethei', we do nothing. But 
this is not in our ppice?- : in a despotism it would be difficult ; we 
live in a free state. If our society be thus crazy, the fear of 
touching it will not prevent it from falling to pieces. If Educa- 
tion be an overwhelming torrent, it is not by attempting to dam 
it up in certain state <?r church channels, that we can hope to 
shut it out. 

" If a tendency to disturbance of the orders exists, it arises, 
not from the new force, but from its misapplication. If Educa- 
tion does harm, it is because it is not distributed in the propor- 
tion, and to the bodies, required. Enlighten all, and you protect 
all : you restore, instead of destrojdng, your equilibrium ; you 
establish peace on lasting foundations ; they who would purchase 
national content with national ignorance, calculate on shadows. 
It is a condition which any day may change, and which, ulti- 
mately, must change, do what they will. By Education, you 
raise up, in all orders in the country, mutual guardians and re- 
sponsible inspectors for the interests of each ; you give the true 
elements of sound public thinking, and purify, to the utmost, 
that strongest of all sanctions, our own conscience, speaking in 
the voice of our neighbor ; you secure in the national mind an 
intelligent tribunal, to which, under every difficulty, aJ7^st and 
wise government may fearlessly appeal ; you provide, against the 
impetuosity and blindness of national passions, habits of thought 
and foresight — against the frenzy of the present, the experience 
of the past. Each order gradually reforms the other; and bears 
down, by the attrition of their different opinions, the asperities 
of sect and party. Every one gradually falls into his position, 
and the position which every one occupies is that which he 
ought. 

*' An educated, a truli/ educated people, know their rights, and, 



88 Wyse on Education Reform. 

knowing, dare maintain them. Even for their mere material in- 
terests, much more for their spiritual, they understand and feel 
that liberty is indispensable. The highest is powerless, the hum- 
blest insecure, without it. Inviolability of person and property, 
impartial distribution of justice, equality before the law, freedom 
of conscience, and freedom of speech, are, in their estimate, ne- 
cessaries. No blessings of despotism can compensate for their 
want or loss. The gifts of ai-bitrary power are false and ' weird ;' 
* its bread tastes of salt.' Industry cannot prosper under the 
patronage of an oppressor : where tyrants reap, few indeed, and 
slovenly, will be the sowers. Where the king's finger can lift 
the latch of the poorest, in that country there can be no home. 
Where the sword prescribes the creed, before those altars there 
may be a ritual, but there can be no religion. Boldly, then, and 
firmly, will such a people stand up against the slightest encroach- 
ment of despotic power; sternly, and unto the death, will they 
contend to secure these franchises. An educated people is mo- 
ral and religious; just, therefore, and generous. They know 
that, as without religion there is no liberty, so, also, without 
liberty there is no law of justice or of charity ; no union beyond 
that of the horse with his rider ; no morality, no religion, no law 
of God, amongst men. True religion cannot be propagated by 
intolerance, nor true liberty by tyranny. Wherever they see 
either, wherever they meet men slandering, persecuting, pro- 
scribing, in these holy names, they know the cause is not from 
God, but from man; they turn from the false prophet and the calf 
worship with loathing and disdain. Not for others, or by others, 
butybr themselves, and by themselves, through the grace of God 
and their own stout arms, clear heads, and lion hearts, are they 
free. They work for their own harvests, and are industrious ; 
they fight for a commonwealth, and are brave : the peer's free- 
dom is the peasant's, and the peasant's the security of the peers; 
each therefore is the willing and trusty guardian of all. To such 
a people, religion, liberty, all that is worthy of the keeping of 
men, may be boldly confided. In what better hands can it be 
placed "? With such watchers before our doors, we may sleep 
in peace. Not a cottage in the land but is a pledge for our 
rights ; for not one which does not contain men who are not only 
free like ourselves, but, like ourselves also, know thoroughly what 
it is to he free. 

" If, then, next to religion, liberty be the great guarantee of 



Wi/se on Education Reform. 89 

human happiness — if it can neither be established nor preserved 
but by knowledge and virtue, and that knowledge and virtue are 
the appanage only of an educated people — who is there of the 
upper class, or indeed of any class, so dead to his own special 
interests, not to speak of those of the community, as to stand a 
moment longer in the way of Popular Education ]" 

After discussing certain local subjects, such as Education 
Reform in Ireland, Tythe and Church (Questions, Pohtical 
Agitation, (fee, all of which are without the range of our re- 
marks, the author concludes his chapter thus : 

" I stated, in the beginning of this chapter, reasoning on pre- 
ceding facts and arguments, that Education was a benefit, a ne- 
cessity, a right : the modifications arising from difference of order, 
country, and political circumstances, so far from militating 
against this position, confirm it. They not only admit the Uni- 
versal Diffusion of Education, but absolutely require it. Whilst, 
then, I am for its highest improvement, I am also for its widest 
extension. In one word, I am, with Dr. Chalmers, for the ut- 
most possible illumination, not only of the popular, but of the 
entire national mind. Whatever is less than this, is defect. No 
order, no sect, no class of men, can be in future left out. The 
whole world is hurrying on; if one class would prevent another 
from pressing and trampling on them, the only way to effect it 
is to press onward themselves. If they would still retain their 
superiority, let them convince themselves it can only be done by 
bringing new claims into the market, not by lingering with the 
old. A system of Education which does not favor this progres- 
sion is an anarchy. It heaps class on class : by keeping any one 
stationary, it dashes the others against it. An education, which 
professes to provide for the order, interests, and happiness of a 
country, must therefore provide not only for all the faculties of 
each particular man, but for every particular man in the country. 
Such an education is, in itself, not only enlightenment, but order. 
It is only when it departs from, or does not reach this, that evils 
follow. It is only then that the struggle between young and 
old, between experience and adventure, between the downward 
stream of habit and the upward tide of opinion, so much dreaded 
by the anti-educationist, is felt. These partial evils are set down 
to Education, They belong solely to its impeded progress, 
pasual aberrations, and still existing distance from perfection. 



90 Wyse on Education Reform. 

" To facilitate, to correct, to advance this first of human bles- 
sings, becomes then, the duty of the true friend of Education — 
of the true lover of his country. To improve Education to the 
utmost, to extend it, thus improved, to the utmost, are the two 
great ends he should have in view. But how is this to be attained ? 
By individual, or by united exertion ? By the people singly, or 
by the government singly, or by both 1 By voluntary means, 
or by coercion ] By suggestion, or by law ] These are ques- 
tions whichhave divided even Educationists. We pass at once 
to their consideration." 

We now proceed to the third and last chapter of the pre- 
sent volume, in which it is asserted, that " National Educa- 
tion should be provided with permanent means for its sup- 
port." 

" Such a thing z,s, gratuitous education, strictly such, is scarcely 
to be found. Alter the form as much as you please, let the sup- 
port come from voluntary societies or benevolent landlords, from 
the state or from the people, money there must be, in some 
shape or other, and coming froin some person or the other, 
before the machine can be set in motion. This cannot be pre- 
vented by any expedient ; all that can be effected is, that the 
moneys so coming be applied to the purposes designed by the 
contributors, and in the manner the best calculated to work them 
out. Of course economy enters here ; for lavish expenditure, 
either of private or public funds, implies diversion from their 
true object, ignorance, negligence, or corruption in the applica- 
tion. So far, economy is necessary ; to carry it farther would 
be impolicy. A mistaken economy, in such a case as that of 
education, is a great folly and a great cruelty. It is a folly, be- 
cause, truly speaking, it is not economy : it generates disorder, 
and then expends to put it down ; but regiments cost more than 
schools, and special commissions not less than regiments : to 
save pence, it expends pounds, shillings, and pence : it reduces 
the school-master's salary by a few hundreds, and lavishes mil- 
lions on barracks and constables. It is a cruelty ; for it produces 
vice, and then punishes it ; it erects gibbets, and supplies them 
with malefactors ; it renders crime inevitable, and then rages 
against criminals. There should be enough, but neither more 
nor less than enough. If economy be essential, it is this alone 
which should be called economy. 



W^se on Education Refarm. 9 1 

"But a system of education, however efficient, which does not 
last, or, however lasting, which is not efficient, is a system either 
ill-established, or ill-supported. To establish well, and to sup- 
port well, two qualities are demanded, efficiency and durability. 

"The best plan, then, for the maintenance of a 'National 
System of Education,' is that which, while it does not neglect 
economy, provides that such system shall be efficient, and durable. 

" But how effect this ] Shall it be provided by ' the indivi- 
dual,' or ' the public ;' by ' the state,' by ' the people,' or by 
' both V 

" It may be asked, if, in so many instances, both public and in- 
dividual gain by open and general competition — why should 
Edtccation be made an object of government protection and 
management only 1 Why should it not rather be left to indi- 
vidual effort and intelligence 1 There is no reason, surely, why 
the laws of demand and supply should in this instance be dif- 
ferent from what they are in every other. If there be the want 
in the country, there will be the desire to satisfy it ; and if there 
be the desire, no great time can elapse before the means of gra- 
tifying it will exist also. In one word, if the nation be sincerely 
anxious for education, it will look for it, as it looks for an in- 
creased quantity of Baltic timber, or of French wines. An 
education market will be opened ; the quantity and quality, like 
that of every other merchandise, will be regulated according to 
the quantity and quality of the public want. If, then, it be 
found injurious to force a market on the public — to glut them 
with articles not required, or of a finer quality than what the 
means of the community can pay for, is it less absurd to compel 
them to take in more education than they may desire, or of a 
description which is above their exigencies or capacity ? Is it 
not against all principles of political economy, mental science, 
and common justice, thus to attempt forcing on them a supply 
for which there is no demand ] is it not ridiculous to drug men 
with instruction when the thirst and hunger for instruction are 
wanting ? Instead, then, of establishing boards and inspectors, 
of voting large sums of money for the building of schools and 
the remuneration of schoolmasters, instead of legislative enact- 
ments and government instruction, would it not be better to 
leave the whole, like the fisheries, or the linen trade, or the silk 
trade, or any other trade, simply and wholly to itself, and trust 
to the growing necessities of civilization for a demand in this 



92 Wyse on Education Reform. 

luxury, as in every other, end, as an inevitable consequence, for 
an ample supply amongst the people themselves, whenever such 
demand shall chance to appear ] 

" But let us now turn to the other side of the question. The 
force of the above argument, in a great degree, depends upon 
the justice of the analogy between education and other articles 
of demand and supply. But is the analogy just % A. good me- 
taphor is not necessarily good logic. Is education to be com- 
pared to the ordinary articles of commerce 1 Is it to be consi- 
dered in the light of jewellery and hardware 1 Is its demand or 
supply to be measured by the laws which regulate that of other 
markets ] Is it not rather to be regarded in the same point of 
view with the Police, with the distribution of Justice, with all 
that immediately belongs to the government and administration 
of a country. Now, if Government be allowed to assume, with- 
out imputation, the ordering and management of one, there is 
surely no reason why it should not be permitted the management 
of the other. No government, no people, could, for a moment, 
think of applying the above reasoning to its armed force or courts 
of justice. No government could afford to wait, in these mat- 
ters, until the people should call for them. A barbarous nation 
would never call ; or so slowly, that it would nearly amount to 
the same thing. The very delay would continue the barbarism ; 
it would more and more adjourn the demand. Such cases re- 
quire the direct intervention of the legislator. It is his duty to 
see that the people, whether they like it or not, be saved from 
misery and crime. Habits are of slow growth, and often of 
very accidental formation. It is the duty of the legislator to see 
that the habits formed be good habits ; that they be formed with 
certainty, and with as much rapidity as may be consistent with 
that certainty. It is his duty, if the people be reluctant or slug- 
gish, to induce or compel the people to these habits, in the same 
manner that he requires from them other duties and sacrifices, 
equally necessary for the good of all. No mercy is shown in 
the hour of pestilential epidemic to the ease, pretensions, or 
scruples of the individual ; all obstacles are swept away, and wisely 
swept away, before the paramount interests of the community. 
The uneducated may complain that they are compelled to educa- 
tion ; the criminal might, with as good reason, complain that he is 
compelled to reform. The instructed and moral should not be ex- 
posed to the contagion either of ignorance or vice. If sacrifices are 



Wyse on Education Reform, 93 

to be made, tliey should be made by those who ought to make 
them ; there is no reason why the soixnd and deserving should 
be surrendered to the caprices of the worthless and corrupt. 
The very object of all government is nothing but this; and its 
goodness or badness is chiefly to be measured by the greater or 
less certainty in effecting it. Courts of justice, the public force, 
prison discipline, are some of the means which it employs for 
this purpose; education and religious instruction, others ; when 
well conducted they are the most powerful of all. Indeed, the 
real power of any depends principally upon education. Habi- 
tual obedience to the laws, reverence for the authority of govern- 
ment — which in a free state ought to be no other than the collec- 
tive authority of the people themselves — against the aggressions 
of individuals, is the most important of all lessons. Where this 
is firmly implanted, the constable's stalf is more potent than 
parks of artillery. A wise parent does not allow his children 
to run waste and wild, until nature shall cry within them for 
moral and intellectual food. In some children, no doubt, such 
impulses are strong and early ; in others late, or not at all. 
Government has the experience and authority of a parent, and 
is called on to begin. The theory which says, ' I will make no 
roads until there first shall be markets,' says, only in other 
words, ' I will make no roads at all.' Wherever roads have 
been made, inarkets have followed. The wholesome circulation 
has flowed, the moment the ligament has been taken off"; indus- 
try has found a vent, capital a convenient investment. Had gov- 
ernment waited until the People had called for roads, until they 
had felt their necessity, or were provided with the means of 
making them, years might have elapsed before the road would 
even have been thought of. Nor would this delay have been ira- 
materiaL It would be equivalent to so much positive loss. The 
public purse would have been defrauded of such amount of 
capital as would equal the sum which might have been accumu- 
lated by the making of the road in the interval. The individual 
would suffer not less than the state. His productive powers 
might as well not exist ; for he would not feel it necessary to 
call them into action. Men do not always know their wants — 
they must be shown them ; it is only by having gratified them, 
they fully feel the desire of gratifying them again. Apply this 
to education. 

" The argument thus preponderates in favor of State manage- 

13 



94 W^se 071 Ethication Reform. 

ment ; but the good or evil, as we have just seen, solely depends 
upon M^hat description of management that may be. There is a 
wide difference between admitting a principle, and admitting its 
applications. The applications, in this instance, may be very va- 
rious. A government may take the whole national education 
into its hands, and compel, by severe penalties, every individual 
not only to frequent its shop, but to frequent no other ; or it may 
interfere, by supporting and regulating, without monopolizing, 
or compelling exclusive attendance on its schools ; or, allowing 
competition, it may still require attendance at some public es- 
tablishment, as the condition for obtaining its rewards ; or, leav- 
ing this to the option of its people, it may limit its interference 
to simple support and regulation ; or, it may content itself with 
support, without insisting on regulation ; or, finally, it may limit 
this support to occasional and conditional aid. All these are 
different modifications, differing in very great degree, to be de- 
termined by time, place, and other adventitious circumstances. 
If education should not be trusted exclusively to the People, 
still less should it be trusted exclusively to the Government. Mo- 
nopoly, of all kinds, is odious and pernicious. It begins by attack- 
ing the public in favor of the individual, and ends by injux'ing the 
individual himself. It overshadows, whilst it imagines it pro- 
tects : if it shuts out the rude visitings of the elements, it shuts 
out the sunshine too. It would prevent man from walking, lest 
he should dash his foot against a stone. It dulls ingenuity, 
numbs effort, quenches desii'e, checks discovery, restricts civili- 
zation : it tames down society to a machine. If this be true in 
the walks of commerce, how much truer in the domains of mind ! 
Commerce, at the sight of shackles, " spreads its light wings, 
and in a moment flies." Mind, if possible, is more fastidious : 
it droops beneath command, or rebels ; it flings off all control, or 
falls a slave at the chariot wheel. Either of these evils is great. 
In the one case all knowledge dies ; in the other, it becomes a 
base and dangerous tool. Such an education would not only be 
a reflection of the existing abuses of Government, but a perma- 
nent bar to their correction. It would act in a vicious circle. In 
a despotism it would perpetuate tyranny by perpetuating slaves ; 
in a free government it could not, consistently with freedom, en- 
dure many years. Next to the imposing a particular church, the 
imposing,' per force, a particular education is a grievance. It is 
the imposing of prohibitions in that very department in which, 



Wyse on Education Reform. 95 

of all others, it is most difficult to prevent smuggling. What a 
host of officials becomes instantly requisite — what a preventive 
service of placemen and churchmen (an espionage to v^^hich all 
others are light,) to detect and denounce every shred of know- 
ledge which does not bear the government stamp ! The contra- 
band article becomes more valued from the moment it becomes 
contraband : its price rises with the efforts made to shut it out. 
To circulate a book in Italy, advertise it in the Index : to crowd 
a conventicle in England, attempt to put it dovv^n. Nor is the 
utter inefficacy of this intellectual police the only absurdity. 
The Government sets up as professor general of morality ; and 
what a growth of lies, evasions, duplicities, perversions, the 
natural consequences of all preventive systems, it immediately 
produces under its protecting and prohibitory rule ! It might 
be expected that there would be some balance of good in re- 
turn — that the mental food provided would at least be worth all 
this cost. It is quite the reverse. Exclusive Government Edu- 
cation does not even answer the purposes for which it is de- 
signed. It is soon converted into a job, of course an expensive 
one, and thus strikes at the root of every principle upon which 
a true system of national education ought to repose. It does 
not even deserve the name ; it is necessarily a fractional, separa- 
tist, sectarian, oligarchical, and not a national, education. Even 
where Government has succeeded in establishing it, this very 
character will render its permanance dubious. Negligence on 
one side — on the other, hostility and activity — will not allow the 
exclusive government system to prosper. It soon falls into a 
plethory of wealth and indolence ; and if it does not perish of 
its own lethargy, ere long its more vigorous rivals, always on the 
watch, always increasing in zeal as in energy, soon seize the 
happy moment to twist it from its seat, and to set up with the 
accumulated advantages of popular partiality in its place. 

"If, therefore, I should be sorry to leave education solely to 
the management of the People, I should feel not less reluctant 
to intrust it solely to the management of the Government. I 
would not have exclusion any where. Government should not 
be allowed to monopolize, but it should be invited to interfere.. 
All portions of the state should co-operate ; but the guiding, 
controlling, and governing portion should do more — it should 
guide, control, and govern Education. Of what nature and ex- 
tent this should be, still I'emains to be determined. 



96 Wyse on Education Reform. 

" Now this must vary considerably in different states and at 
different periods. There are, however, certain conditions com- 
mon to all, which cannot be neglected in the consideration of 
any. The first of these is an immediate deduction from the 
principles just noticed. If Government interfere, it should be 
beneficially. To interfere beneficially, it should have, in the first 
instance, the co-operation of the People. Without the co-ope- 
ration of the People, it is obvious that all interference of Govern- 
ment, whatever may be its intentions, must be powerless or per- 
nicious. Such interference would differ little from the monopoly 
and exclusion condemned above. It is nearly the same thing 
whether Government prevents the People from talcing advan- 
tage of the means offered, or offers them an article which the 
People either do not want, or do not like." 

" Government interference must be patient and gradual. Too 
violent a change, too sudden an effort to rouse sympathies not 
yet awake, will not do. It is ineffectual and injurious, bad phi- 
losophy and bad policy. The co-operation of the public, if rudely 
summoned, will not come. Too strong a tone of authority rouses 
suspicion ; suspicion, in a community where competition is free, 
soon grows into hostility. The People cannot comprehend, at 
first, the meaning of such call ; they do not understand the neces- 
sity of education— they have not experienced its want or use. 
The first duty, then, of G overnment, is to inspire this feeling. 
This cannot be accomplished without some knowledge, and more 
time. Compulsory enactments are, for this reason, more likely 
to be effective in an advanced, than in an early stage of educa- 
tion. The reason is obvious. In every man already educated, 
there is an ally. One of the strongest effects of education is to 
convince a man, every hour of his life, in every faculty, of its 
value. This value makes him earnest for its improvement and 
extension ; and the more convinced, the more earnest will he be. 
Compulsory laws, in such a stage, will only act against the strag- 
glers. The great mass of the community will give their sanc- 
tion; the few reluctants must obey. In such a stage, compulsion 
will succeed. It will complete, in a short period, what might 
otherwise have taken much trouble and too much time. In the 
very beginning of education, on the contrary, another course 
must be adopted. It is then, that gentleness and persuasion — 
that gradual, almost imperceptible, developments — that rewards, 
that solicitations, that patient and persevering approaches, 



Wyse on Education Reform. 97 

through the predilections, and prejudices, and even passions of 
the country — must be the main instruments. The savage should 
be considered, even in his shyness ; he should be won over by 
kindness, and not violently driven forward to the genial uses of 
civilized life. Government should study for this, in the first 
place, the nature and habits of its people — how formed, by what 
circumstances, in what seasons ; how much is owing to primi- 
tive organization, how much to the after action of social or poli- 
tical life. It should thoroughly sift, and perfectly understand 
all this — the men, the place, the times. The sluggish, who re- 
quire the spur, are not to be treated as the hot and heedless, 
who require the bit. The neglect of these considerations is the 
fertile principle of most of the disappointments and failures we 
daily meet with. If, on one side, by too sudden and rigid a mode 
of proceeding, the hostility of large portions of the country is 
likely to be excited ; so, on the other, by too immediate and lavish 
a concession to applications, a corresponding negligence and 
apathy are produced. The bread of labor is, of all others, the 
sweetest. What a class, or individual, attains by a wish only, is 
soon supposed to be scarcely worth the wish. What contrasts 
exist between mountainous and valley districts ! The mountain 
is poor, but the inhabitant is always industrious, and generally 
comfortable ; the plain is rich, but the inhabitant is generally 
indolent, and frequently poor. Difficulties overcome beget a 
facility in overcoming difficulties : a valuable habit is far more 
valuable than any single acquisition to which it may lead. Nor 
is this all. There is another m.otive for activity, another gua- 
rantee for security. The acquisitions of joint exertion are joint 
property; for this joint property there will necessarily be a joint 
zeal. If the people receive alHrora government and give nothing 
for what they receive ; if they have only to ask for education in 
order to obtain it; if they have not even to ask, but merely to 
accept; on all the principles of human nature, the people will 
value little the gift so proffered, even should they accept it ; and, 
valuing it but little, will feel little careful to turn it to account. 
It will, in every sense, be a mere Government education, the pro- 
perty of Government, not theirs ; it will be an easily acquired 
education, therefore despised ; it will be an education which they 
did not set up, and which they do not think themselves called on 
to maintain. But, besides this, there will be another evil. Such 
an education is a gratuity — it is a chai'ity : what the poor-house 



98 Wyst on Education Reform. 

loaf is in a physical sense, this is in a spiidtual — the unearned 
bread of sloth and mendicancy. He who receives it, stamps 
himself a pauper. This humbles, degrades, demoralizes. If in 
one sense it is education, it is anti-education in another. Self- 
respect and self-control, the two great reciprocal springs of the 
entire machine, are broken or blunted. How inconsistent to 
teach, in words, the duty of labor, the sweetness of honest employ- 
ment, the honor of well-sustained independence ; and in deeds, 
that labor may be a duty, but it shall not be required ; that honest 
acquirement may be a pleasure, but it shall be discouraged ; that 
independence may be an honor, but it shall not be permitted ! 
The taint of such contradictions will cliiJg to it. It will be taken 
thanklessly by the idle, and reluctantly by the industrious. Half 
the grace and utility of the gift will be lost by this fatal associa- 
tion with alms-houses, overseers, and settlements. Education, 
to be such in its useful and honorable sense, should be rescued 
from all humiliating defilements. It should be set up over all 
the grovelling passions of our nature, a rich prize for those who 
know how to woo and win it; easily attainable to the rich, not 
beyond the reach of the poor, but from both requiring sacrifice ; 
both giving, that both may receive. 

" The people should, then, be called on, as well as the Govern- 
ment, to contribute their funds and exertions to the establishment 
and maintenance of Public Education. The amount and pro- 
portion of such contributions must depend on circumstances. 
They should be regulated by time, place, and means ; by the 
peculiar position of the respective countries and classes for whom 
the education is designed. This matter will be discussed when 
we treat of application : we are here limited to theory, 

"But the calling on the People to contribute to tlie support of 
Education, either in funds or exertions, necessarily implies a per- 
mission to the People to interfere in the management and control 
of hotli funds arid education. This is but strict justice. However 
applied, the money still belongs to them. Government cannot, 
without risk of nullifying its own pretensions, and injuring 
instead of serving Education, reject this claim. Nor is it only 
strict justice, but strict policy. More efficient means for ' utili- 
sing' the system cannot be devised. By requiring contributions 
and co-operation, you put in action all the stimulants of property ; 
you allow the People, by sharing in the management, to evince 
how strongly and beneficially such stimulants can act. No funds 



Wt/se on Education Reform. 99 

are more liberally contributed than those given by the People. 
No institutions are managed better than those where the People 
themselves are invited to intervene. 

" But the management is not intrusted to either Government 
or People for the mere self-gratification of power. It is not 
sufficient to show that it is every way practicable ; it must be 
proved, by the benefits it tends to confer, that it is worth redu- 
cing to practice. It must be proved that Government interfe- 
rence is calculated to procure advantages to the People. Unless 
this be effected, no matter how generously, mildly, and unosten- 
tatiously it be exercised, the People will reject it as a clog. 
What, then, are these advantages ] How are the People to be 
persuaded they are such 1 To persuade the Peoj)le, there is, in 
the long run, but one expedient — ' Esse quam videri' — to he, 
rather than seevi. Give the People decided and unquestionable 
pi'oof ; and, no matter what may be their resistance at first, in 
the end they will acquiesce. Knowledge itself, as it advances, 
will wash the blindness from their eyes. If Truth be with you, 
the very light you spread will more clearly show the crowd that 
it is Truth. But Truth it must he ; government must not be 
an empiric. Solid, downright, intelligible truth, must be the 
indispensable characteristic of all its improvements. All expe- 
riments for winning the People by ingeimities and surprises — 
knacks at educating, as children are wheedled into study by toy- 
things — are not only absurd, not only an operose kind of idleness, 
but a serious and lasting injury, both to Government and Peo- 
ple. They abridge immeasurably the power to do, and the dis- 
position to accept, good. Fresh attempts, even when judicious, 
are embarrassed with difficulties by such a course ; the wisest 
arran^ment seems only an accident, a felicitous blunder into 
good, an unconscious jerk into common sense. Truth, then — 
truth first, and truth last — ought to be the directing principle of 
all Government management. This truth must be sought by 
patient, minute, dispassionate inquiry, until found ; when found, 
by calm, but firm resolution, despite of party clamor, convenience, 
or time, it must be effectually reduced to practice. A Govern- 
ment which will not, or cannot, do both, ought not to interfere at 
all. No evil, in these matters, is worse than oscillation between 
good and bad principles ; the loosening and tightening the reins 
by caprice or chance; the impelling forward the People towards 
certain hopes, and then pulling them back, through fear or sloth, 



100 Wyse on Education Reform. 

to leave them in the same or a worse state than they were before. 
A government, which has finally made up its mind to take upon 
itself so important, but so difficult, a task as the training and 
wielding the mind of its people, ought to arm itself with a forti- 
tude and a perseverance of mail proof. Difficulties it will meet 
from human nature, from party feud, from religious intolerance, 
sufficient to tax the loftiest enthusiasm, and the most vigorous 
and dauntless purpose. But this very steadiness in right is, in 
itself, a weapon. Men argue, from constancy, favorably. Such 
a course soon enlists numerous co-operators ; numbers will gain 
numbers, and success generate success. But to effect this there 
must be real value. The utility of such interference must be 
certain and conspicuous. 

" To insure this, Government intei'ference must be enlight- 
ened, and enlightening. Government must not interfere unne- 
cessarily ; nor too frequently ; nor where others may interfere 
with more justice and effect than itself. But where such is not 
the case, it must holdhj, 'peremftorily, and decisively stand for- 
ward ; the ' dignus vindice nodus' is there ; common sense will 
applatid, and true freedom acquiesce. To combine together the 
energies, intellectual and moral, of a people, to direct them in 
the most easy manner, and in the shortest time, to objects of recog- 
nised public utility, is an end worthy of the efforts of any country. 
If these ends can be attained by the Government more rapidly 
than by the People, then ought the Government to step forward 
before the People, and the People gratefully to make way for 
the Government. But is not this the case with Education % 
Leave it to the People, and what is the result % If they educate, 
they educate in sections. One district is provided with schools 
by general subscription, or individual munificence ; another is 
left to its own apathy, poverty, and ignorance. This produces a 
most heterogeneous state of society. You generate elements 
the most diverse by the same laws. Education is brought, by 
the operation of public opinion alone, in some degree to the 
level demanded by the wants and knowledge of the country. 

" Government can establish this very harmony, so desirable to 
the country and the individual ; Government can extend it, when 
established, with comparatively a trifling effort, to every part of 
the land. Government can share with the poor the superfluity 
of the rich ; can dissipate the blindness of the ignorant with the 
light of the informed; can call into active and universal aid, all 



Wyse on Education Reform. 101 

tending to the same point, all passing through the best channels,! 
the dispersed forces, the isolated intentions, the ardent, but in- 
operative feelings of each portion of the community. Govern- 
ment, in one word, can balance and adjust, can rectify and com- 
pensate for the injustice of place or position, and out of the 
scattered elements educe that perfect beauty of co-operation, 
both in principle and practice, which constitutes the use, safety, 
and importance of every description of social machinery. Gov- 
ernment is the centre, necessarily, of every political and social 
force. Nor is it less the repository of every new accession of 
intellectual and moral knowledge. All improvements in the 
science of mind, in the art of teaching, must pass under its eye, 
must be within its reach* 

" The importance of selecting proper Teachers has been al- 
ready insisted on. It is still more important than the selection 
of books. Good books may become unprofitable without good 
Teachers. Knowledge is not always to be found, even where it 
most abounds : there must be communicators of the treasure — 
there must be instructors. By whom are they to be chosen 1 by 
whom provided ? Popular Teachers must unite two qualifica- 
tions ; they must be acceptable to the People, and they must be 
qualified to teach the People. The most admirable lessons will 
make little impression on an unwilling audience. It is quite 
right that the People should be attached to their instructors ; and 
it is not less obvious, that this attachment cannot exist without con- 
fidence. Confidence is the offspring of esteem ; and the first requi- 
site for such is, that the object of it be, in part at least, of their owre 
selection. But it is not less requisite, that he be fully qualified to 
justify it. The Teacher must, in every particular, ho. fitted for 
his situation. His character and capacity must be unquestiona- 
ble. But who is to judge of this % Who is the hest qualified to 
judge of it? The People, in general, are suflaciently compe- 
tent to judge of character ; not so of capacity. They may feel, 
perfectly, that the candidate is irreproachable in morals, conci- 
liating in conduct, well known for decency, regularity, and atten- 
tion to all social duties. But they can form little opinion, or at 
least little sound opinion, of his qualifications for teaching. To 
educate, a man must be educated ; and to judge of the qualifi- 
cations of an educator, a man must in some degree be quali- 
fied to he one himself. But where are these judges to be 
found ? Even if the iudges existed, where exist the sub- 

14 



102 'Wyse on Education Reform. 

jects for their selection ? Good Teachers, educators in the 
true sense of the word, are not to be found amongst the igno- 
rant. If they were, it is not likely they would remain there, or, 
if they remained, that they would be selected by the Parishioners, 
in the remoter parishes of the Empire. Even in towns, how 
few who can teach at all ! and of those few, what a miserable 
proportion who can teach well ! From whence, then, is to come, 
in the first instance, the supply ? and, in the next, the selection ? 
Assuredly, not from the blind, but the enlightened. They only 
who understand what Education really is, can educate the can- 
didates for these important functions ; they only can wisely 
choose between them, when the public exigencies require a 
choice. Not, then, in the hands of the People should lie either 
the training, or selection, of public Teachers. It is a task to 
which the Government alorie is competent — which, for the sake 
of the People itself, the Government should boldly and largely 
assume." 

" But the Government, it is alleged, is already too poioerful — 
giving it these attributes, we give it Education ; giving it Edu- 
cation, we give it a power which embraces every other — we sur- 
render into its hands the direction and mastery of our entire 
political and religious, our public and private existence.- Is 
there any reason to think it will not abuse it 1 Are the men 
who constitute it usually exempt from the ordinary vices and 
tendencies of humanity % Shall we trust to any body of men 
the complete disposal of our own, and our children's prosperity % 
To these apprehensions the answer is simple. What we so 
much fear to do, we have done already. If power is to be lodged 
no where, society is one great blunder. We should, in consis- 
tency, return to our forests. What are our religious, judicial, 
political establishments, but sacrifices of the many to the few — of 
a part, for the whole % If Government is to be merely an irre- 
flective, mechanical instrument, we ought to adopt the code of 
the Athenians, plead causes before thousands of judges, atid 
abstain from the appointment of a single oflScer until he had first 
been polled for, in every district in the kingdom. The discovery 
of the advantages of delegation, is one of the great boasts of 
modern liberty. To it, more than to superior judgment or mo- 
deration, modern free states not only owe their security, but 
their freedom. A representative and executive body are equally 
necessary in every free state ; but to give each their full value, 



Wyse on Education Reform. 103 

it is not less necessary tbey should be directive than delegated. 
The one checks the defects of the other; the directive character 
rescues the delegated body from the inertness of a mere agent, 
and the delegated precludes the abuse of the directive. It im- 
plies responsibility. Once establish this principle firmly, and 
act upon it rigidly, and you may enlarge the directive powers as 
much as you please. The point, then, for us to consider, is not 
tJie more or less of power vs^hich we intrust to Government, but 
the more or less fidelity, the more or less capacity, with which this 
power is wielded. If the country be free, it is, of course, as- 
sumed that it possesses the means to insure this. It can enforce 
the faithful discharge of these duties, by both punishment and 
reward. Its ministers are amenable to its legislature, and its 
legislature to the country. Why, then, should it shrink from 
using, in the largest and most efficient manner, its own instru- 
ments to do its own behests. If the case, indeed, be othei'wise — 
if any of this machinery be defective — the argument, of course, 
alters. Then, indeed, jealousy is in place. We cannot, without 
great probability of abuse, vest the governing of the mind of 
the country in ministers who are independent of legislators, or 
in legislators who, in turn, are independent of those from whom 
they are, and for whom they legislate. But, in such a case, our 
duty would be not to stop here ; it would not be enough to res- 
cue Education from their hands ; on the same principle we ought 
to rescue from them the Pulpit, the Jiidgment bench, the Public 
force. But would this be possible ] Would it be less than the 
dissolution of all government % A simple and juster course 
would be to reform it. Purify the source, and the streams will 
be pure. Place the Legislature and Executive under the con- 
trol of the People ; and the People may safely allow them to 
direct and check, to force and govern, for them, as they please. 

When I propose, then, to intrust the administration to the 
Governrnent, it is not for the sake of the Government, but of the 
People. I ititrust, therefore, only so much of it as the Govern- 
ment can administer better than the People ; the rest I leave 
to the People, for their own management, as well as use. There 
is thus no reason why, in both the instances just given, the Peo- 
ple should not also intervene. If the Government, on its side, 
provide books, the People should not be restricted exclusively 
to their use. No particular pattern should be insisted on, as the 



104 Wyse on 'Education Reform. 

sole, the essential of education. Government should show, and 
lead ; the People should be invited and induced to follow. In 
like manner, Government should leach and select the masters ; 
but the Peojole, on their side, should be protected from the im- 
position of hostile and obnoxious teachers. They should be re^ 
quired to take the government qualifications, but not necessarily 
the government man. 

*' This principle, then, and this principle extended throughout, 
is what ought to regulate the distribution of the different shares 
of co-operation and management which should fall respectively 
to the Government and to the People. The Government, being 
more qualified to take the initiative, should he the first to centric 
bute the funds, the first to organize the schools, the first to provide 
the materials, whether of hooks or teachers, for the People. In 
one word, the Government should be, essentially and constantly, 
the directive and impelling jDrinciple. The People, on their side, 
should be the aiding and supporting. They also should give 
their contributions ; but they should be consequent on those of 
the Government, extended over a longer period, and paid in 
support of such objects as do not require large and immediate 
disbursements. The Government should establish — they should 
maintain. They should repair the scJwols, support the schoolmas^ 
ters, and augment the libraries which the Government had be^ 
stowed. Out of this combination, out of this division of labors 
and powers, a sort of moral personification of the real wisdom 
and energy of a free and enlightened state would arise. The 
Government would be the eye, the People the arm ; but with 
such a dependence each upon the other, that if from the Gov- 
ernment the People learned how to see, the Government, in 
turn, should learn from the People how to act. If the People 
could ascend, as well as the Government, to general principles, 
or the Government could descend as well as the People to de- 
tails, always independent of each other, they would necessarily 
exist in the state of continued discord ; their connexion could 
scarcely subsist. But in the harmony which circumstances have 
thus fortunately established between them, scarcely less the re- 
sult of their qualities than of their deficiencies, every thing tends 
to one common end. It is difficult to say who most contributes ; 
each receives the impulse of the other ; each in its turn obeys, 
§ii)d both at all times are masters. 



Wyse on Education Reform. 106 

" Such, then, is the principle ; but how provide for its appli- 
cation ] Here, again, we have to deal with modifications of 
time, place, and men ; they are objects of subsequent delibera^ 
tion. For the present, we can merely advert to what imme- 
diately arises from the preceding considerations, and applies 
equally to every case where the above principle is admitted. 

" If the Government is to have the initiative, if the Govern- 
ment is to originate, to establish, to direct, it can only be by 
means of order and system. So vast an object as Education, 
scattered loosely amongst its several departments, will produce 
confusion in the management of these departments, confusion 
in the management of education. If left to the care of every 
one, it will not be taken care of by any. Order thus implies 
subordination ; and suboi'dination, a distinct and well-organized 
department — a department confined to Education alone. To 
constitute such, there ought to be consultors to deliberate, and 
a head to direct ; in other words, a Board and a President. But, 
to preclude abuse, he should be responsible to the Legislature- 
The President ought to be a Minister, and, to preclude, as much 
as possible, change and disturbance — here disturbance would 
be peculiarly injurious — a permanent one. Nor will this be suf- 
ficient. The People must not only have a security against 
alteration, but also against ignorance or favoritism ; they must 
have a due motive for confidence in the wisdom and impartiality 
of these organs. They must be chosen in harmony with their 
feelings, and as much as possible from persons well acquainted, 
with and sympathizing in their wants. The People must not be 
solely in the hands of the aristocracy, nor a dissenting population 
in the hands of the establishment. The Board must be consti^ 
tuted of the representatives of the different classes, and of the 
different persuasions, of most influence in the community. Such 
should be the organization ; the means to work it, should be in 
harmony with it. The Board, so constituted, should have under 
its control large funds, for the building of schools, and the gene- 
ral originating of Education ; extensive establishments for the 
education of Teachers, due provision for the publication of 
books ; and officers sufficiently numerous and qualified for the 
inspection and superintendence of the entii-e machinery. The 
People, on their side, should be equally provided with their 
organization and instruments. They should have their ' School 



106 Wyse on Education 'Reform. 

Committees' and ' School Officers ;' their power of ' School 
Assessment,' their funds, their financial control, their inspection- 
The friendly and reciprocal play of these several powers will 
secure not only their free action, but their unbroken perma- 
nence ; they are guarantees each for the other ; so far from 
being opposed, they are allies ; they are not for the individual, 
but for the community. 



APPENDIX. 



The following remai-ks should have been inserted at page 82 : 
" We are constantly employed in raising barriers against vice and corrup- 
tion, and as constantly in supplying the principles and causes which render 
such checks both necessary and ineffectual. But the political body cannot be 
pure unless its members be pure; nor can the legislator of to-day be a true 
patriot, unless the pupil of yesterday be first instructed and diligently practised 
in true patriolisin. Here, then, as in every other walk, does the vista terminate 
in Education. If we are to have virtue, we must teach virtue; the fruits are 
not rained like manna from heaven, they are to be gathered from the tree. Nor 
let it be said, because such education is still wanting, that to supply the want is 
impracticable ; let it not be said, that education is incapable of producing even 
far more marvellous results. Why should its arm be shortened, or its power 
straightened 1 What is more wonderful than what it actually does produce 7 
Men are not born intriguers, or swindlers — this very depravity, this very dis- 
tortion, requires training; bad, or good, it is still Education. If it works in 
wrong so powerfully and so truly, why should it not work, also, with the same 
truth, and with the same power, in good 1 

" I am quite aware how totally contrasted all this is to the prevalent doctrine 
and practice. But the question is, not whether an opinion be prevalent, but 
whether it be just. I write on Education Reform; the very word implies there 
are errors to correct, and abuses to suppress. These abuses do not appear in 
the seed, but in the fruit. When it is too late to check them, we feel their 
effects. Our actual system, pursued to its conclusion, is a heap of senseless 
contradictions. Varro admitted three educations — ' Educat nutrix, instituit 
pcedagogus, docet magister ;' — but these were differences in form only. Mon- 
tesquieu three also ; his are essentially distinct. We liave ten times that num- 
ber, all opposed to each other, each in strife with itself. Up to the age of entry 
on the world, we are taught virtue and Christianity — virtue on a large cosmo- 
polite scale ; Christianity on the rigid and positive principles of the Gospel. 
' Speak truth,' ' Do to others as you would be done by, ' Bear not false witness 
against your neighbor,' ' Be just, kind, and generous to all ;' this is our cate- 
chism ; which, if we practise not, we are told we shall be outcasts in this world, 
and accursed in the next. But the moment we stand on the threshold of the 
school, and are about to begin the education of public life, up starts another cate- 
chist, with a very different morality. He also talks virtue and religion, it is true, 
but gradually modifies, and paraphrases away, one by one, every one of its pre- 
cepts. Truth, generosity, frankness, &c., are still commended ; but on examin- 
ing more minutely, we find that his truth is little more than the art of lying with 
plausibility ; his generosity, the gentle code, ' ote-toi de la, que je me mette a ta 
place;' his frankness under courteous forms, universal suspicion; Ais patriot- 
ism, a prudent knowledge of the world, such as Walpole defined it — ' skill in 



108 "^ APPENDIX. 

discerning characters, with tlie arts of intrigue, low cunning, self-interest, and 
other mean motives ;' his public spirit, the dividing the shells to others, the keep- 
ing the oyster for one's self. Even these appearances, flimsy as they are, ere 
long are thrown aside. The desolating doctrine, the practical atheism, ' Suc- 
cess is every thing,' is then unblushingly set up, and the Goddess of Reason 
shamelessly enthroned upon the altar of Qod, and conscience itself. But not 
only are these educations directly at variance ; but, still more monstrous, they 
are all combined together. Every Sunday the same lesson of early education is 
again repeated to the same number of professing believers, and every week the 
same doctrines of worldly wisdom, in open contradiction to those early lessons, 
are sedulously reduced to practice by these once-a-week saints. Once for all, 
let us be one thing or the other ; let us at least know distinctly what wewould he 
at. If the Gospel be the Gospel, if it be a law, given by God to man, it must 
be an universal and unvarying rule of human conduct. It admits of no com- 
promise; no God and Mammon spirit ; no Judas-kissing in friendship ; no Tar- 
tuffism in religion ; Christ has made no exception for Politicians, no more than 
for Pharisees. If our education be worth any thing, it is as the means of form- 
ing, not the sckool-boi/s character, but the man's character ; if we are to leave its 
lessons at the door on our departure, throw the Gospel into the fire, and, by all 
means, let us have Lord Chesterfield. Tell us, when we are young, what you 
so often tell us when we grow old ; show us, as clearly as you now do, that 
truth is folly, and religion bigotry, and swindling patriotism, and honor beg- 
gary, and virtue (with Brutus at Philippi) a mere name. This at least would 
simplify the matter, and exempt us from the necessity of learning two doctrines i 
one exoteric, another esoteric; one for the multitude, another for ourselves; be- 
ginning with an education which we must afterwards unlearn ; talking a Chris- 
tianity, which, at every step, we deny and blaspheme with our lives. There 
would be sense, and almost morality, in that; at least it would lead to morality; 
for if men taught what they practised — if they were Candidas well as bad — 
society itself Would soon take the alarm, and, from sheer instinct of self-preser- 
vation, ' crush the infamy in the bud.' In a word, I would place our lives and 
our educations, in one way or other, in harmony with each other. If we ought 
not to pervert early education so as to accord with after^education, are we not 
bound so far to purify after-education as to put it in accord with early ? But 
how is this to be done? By beginning with early education itself; by giving 
such an education, to the very i/ifant, as will defy all these corrupt educations 
of our after-years. Every man who has a conscience, and good faith enough 
to ask it the question, that is, who has no intrigue planned or in progress, no 
spoils to enjoy, no reputation to i-estore, no rival to persecute, will find this 
answer I now give him, if he takes the trouble to look for it, in his orvn heart. 
All I want is, to bring this an-swer out— to put this conviction into deed. 1 want 
to make our Gospel education — not as it now is, in so many instances, a melan- 
choly delusion, but a living, speaking, acting, thoroughly efficient, reality. The 
task is difficult ; but is the difficulty invincible 1 If I could think for a moment 
that it were, then, indeed, should I despond ; we should not only be fools in 
attempting so much, but in attempting any thing at all. Education would be a 
wretched chimera— the Gospel itself a vanity. 



PROSPECTUS 



COMMERCIAL ACADEMY, 



1,83 BROADWAY, N. Y. 



CONDUCTED 

BY B. F. FOSTER, 

AUTHOR OF THK ART OF RAPID WRITING ILLUSTRATED AND EXPLAINED J 

A CONCISE TREATISE ON BOOK-KEEPING J ELEMENTARY COPY BOOKS ; 

COMMERCIAL CORRESPONDENCE, &C. 



NEW YORK. 
1837. 



BooE-KEEFiNQ IS an art which no condition of life can render 
useless, and which must contribute to the advancement of all who 
buy or sell — of all who wish to keep or improve their possessions— 
of all who desire to be rich, and all who desire to be wise. Let no' 
man enter into business while he is ignorant of the method of regu- 
lating books. — Dr. Johnson. 



PROSPECTUS. 



Classical and mathematical education is for the 
most part carefully attended to, in addition to which? 
the lawyer, the physician, and the clergyman, each 
devotes years in preparing himself for the peculiar 
practice of his profession ; but the young man in- 
tended for a merchant, is left to grope his way, so 
far as a prior qualification is concerned, in compara- 
tive ignorance. When placed in the counting-house 
he enters a school, with this disadvantage, that he is 
without an instructor ; for it is neither the duty nor 
interest of the senior clerks to deviate from the rou- 
tine of their own labors to impart that information 
which may enable another to supersede themselves ; 
and the merchant himself is generally too much oc- 
cupied with business to take the trouble ; hence, the 



4 PROSPECTUS. 

joung clerk has to pick up his knowledge as he can, 
and gets into the way of performing his duties by 
dint of repetition only. If youth whose views are 
directed to commerce, instead -of spending three or 
four years in acquiring what is of no practical use in 
business, were to devote an equal period in the 
attainment of a thorough knowledge of figures, mer- 
chants' accounts, and book-keeping, much advan- 
tage might be derived both to themselves and the 
community. 

There are probably thousands who yearly visit this 
city, for the purpose of devoting themselves to mer- 
cantile pursuits, w^hose Penmanship -is totally unfit 
for the Journal, the Ledger, or even for a common 
Bill of Parcels, and whose knowledge of figures and 
Book-keeping is so limited that they can neither cal- 
culate the interest on an account-current, equate a 
payment, nor record a simple transaction accurately. 
For the want of this requisite information., they are 
compelled to drudge, for years, in subordinate situa- 
tions ; whereas had they been previously qualified, 
ivith special reference to this employment^ they would 
have freely commanded a liberal salary. 

The design of Foster's Commercial Academy is 
to afibrd young men an opportunity of acquiring, in 
a short period, a free, rapid hand-ivriting ; expert- 



PROSPECTUS. O 

ness in figures; a practical knowledge of book-keep- 
ifig, and merchants^ accounts; branches which, 
independently of their intrinsic importance, conduce 
most effectually to advancement in any mercantile 
situation. 

The course of instruction comprehends all the in- 
formation connected with the duties of a merchant's 
clerk, and is peculiarly adapted to the wants of a 
commercial community. 

Penmanship is taught upon a novel and improved 
plan, combining legibility with ease and rapidity of 
execution. Mr. Foster has given the most careful 
attention to the various causes which occasion bad 
writing, and is consequently desirous that this estab- 
lishment may be viewed as a complete school for 
penmanship on undisputed principles, and as a barrier 
against the vague and improper encroachments of as- 
sumed talent so often pressed upon the notice of the 
public. 

Book-keeping, as applied to inland and foreign 
trade, is particularly attended to, and the most modern 
and approved methods of arranging and classifying 
merchants' accounts ; closing and re-opening books, 



b PROSPECTUS. 

adjusting individual and partnership concerns, Stc. 
are fully explained and exemplified. By divesting 
this study of numerous intricate terms and compli- 
cated entries too commonly adopted, the art is so 
simplified, that its principles are easily comprehend- 
ed ; while their application to the ordinary transac- 
tions in trade is rendered apparent. 

Commercial Arithmetic, with its application to 
the existing practices of trade, showing the abbre- 
viated methods employed by merchants and brokers 
for the valuations and allowances of merchandise ; 
the calculations of per centages, interest, commis- 
sions, exchanges, equation of payments, &c. forms 
a prominent feature in the course of instruction. 

Mercantile Correspondence. — This depart- 
ment of instruction has been so long needed, that it 
would be useless to enlarge upon its utility. It will 
embrace every particular relating to commercial 
letter writing, including all the details of folding 
and superscribing; together with the forms of 
commercial documents, such as Bills, Invoices, Ac- 
count-sales, Bills of Lading, Protests, Insurance 
Policies, Promissory Notes, Accounts-current, &c. 



PROSPECTUS. 7 

Mr. Foster wishes it to be distinctly understood, 
that he does not profess to "perfect pupils in twelve ^ 
easy lessons of one hour each"! He cannot limit 
himself to a precise number of lessons, as the suc- 
cessful attainment of an art must, in every instance, 
depend materially upon the capacity, attention, in- 
dustry, and perseverance of the learner. In order, 
however, to enable young men to complete their 
studies efficiently, and in the shortest possible time, 
in addition to his own personal efforts, experienced 
and competent assistants are engaged. The division 
of labor in this institution is so nicely carried out, 
and the adjustment of the various parts so complete, 
that they cannot fail to produce, without loss of time, 
a sound and finished mercantile education. 

This, then, in brief, is the outline of the plan, 
upon which Foster's Commercial Academy is 
conducted ; the extensive support it has hitherto re- 
ceived, from the mercantile community in particular, 
and the public in general, has called forth renewed 
efforts to render it, in every respect, worthy the at- 
tention of those for whose improvement and benefit 
it is designed, and no labor or expense will be spared 
to qualify young men to fulfil the duties of the count- 
ing-house with credit to themselves and satisfaction 
to their employers. 



8 PROSPECTUS. 

The advantages of this institution, although avail- 
able to all classes, are yet more particularly held out 
to the follow^ing : — 

1. To young men who have completed their clas- 
sical and general education, and who wish to acquire 
rapidly, those qualifications which are especially re- 
quisite for commerce. 

2. To young persons whose friends are desirous 
that they should receive the practical advantages here 
offered, in addition to those they may have acquired 
at school. 

3. To foreign gentlemen desirous of becoming 
well acquainted with the language and commerce 
of the country. This class may, while they are 
enlarging their mercantile and general knowledge, 
obtain an intimate acquaintance with the English 
language. 

4. Adults, who experience any difficulty in the 
free use and command of the pen, or those who 
from inattention or the want of proper instruction, 
write an irregular scrawl, may have these obstacles 
removed in a. few lessons, and acquire a rapid, easy 
business-like style. 



RULES AND REGULATIONS. 



1. The TERMS aie payable at entrance, namely, on taking the first lesson 
from this rule there can be no deviation. 

2. The hours of instruction are from 9 to 12 in the morning ; from 2 to 5 
in the afternoon, and from 7 to 9 o'clock in the evening. 

3. In all well regulated establishments strict order and decorum are ob- 
served ; every member attends to his own duties without in any way inter- 
fering with the other clerks ; and, as this institution is preparatory to the 
eounting-house, and is conducted on similar principles, it is earnestly 
requested that all Jiecessary conversation, during the hours of instruction, be 
carried on in an under tone. 

4. The students, at this institution, being governed by the principles of 
honor, it is only considered necessary to suggest what is required of them 
to insure a ready compliance ; and, as these regulations are intended for 
their general good and advancement, they will, it is not doubted, be rightly 
appreciated. 

TERMS. 

The following branches are taught at the prices affixed, which being paid 
on entrance, entitle the pupil to remain at the Academy until he is com- 
pleted, without further expense, except for books and stationary. 

For a course of Lessons in Penmanship, in which the learner is taught 

to write a neat, rapid business hand, . . . . . . 15 00 

For a course of Lessons in Book-keeping, in %vhich the learner will be 

qualified to act as Book-keeper in the most extensive establishment, . 15 00 

For a course of Lessons in CoMMERciAii Calculations; by which those 
who have neglected their Arithmetic, may acquire simple and expeditious 
methods of performing the various computations in business, . . 15 00 

For a- course of Lessons in Mercantile Letter Writing, in which the 
student will practise all the modes and forms that are in daily use in the 
Counting house; including circulars, letters of advice, notice of consign- 
ments, remittances, &c. ....... 15 00 

Foil A course of Private Lessors in either of the above branches to one 

individual, at the class rooms, or at his residence, ... S5 00 

*^.* The charge for quills and ink is $1 50 cents per quarter. 

O' A limited number of pupils, under sixteen years of age, will be re- 
ceived by the quarter ; but the institution is more particularly designed for 
Young Men and Merchants' Clerks. 



NEW WORKS, 

RECENTLY PUBLISHED, 

And for sale hy the Author at his Academy, 183 Broadway, 
and by the Booksellers generally. 



1. A CONCISE TREATISE ON BOOK-KEEPING; 

elucidating the Principles and Practice of Double Entry and 
the modern methods of arranging merchants' accounts. Second 
Edition, revised, enlarged, and greatly improved ; — to which is 
added a chapter on Equation of Payments, Commercial 
Terms, &c. By B. F. Foster. 1 vol. 8vo. pp. 200. 

This is decidedly the best treatise on Book-keeping which we have 
seen. It is simple, concise, and well arranged. Mr. Foster 'has confined 
himself to a plain explanation of the art, as practised in mercantile establish- 
ments, and we warmly recommend the result of his labors to the public. — 
Boston Atlas. 

This work exhibits a comprehensive illustration of the art as it is prac- 
tised in well regulated counting houses. The author, who is a practical 
accountant, has displayed an extensive knowledge of his subject, and has 
produced a work which is of infinite value to those who have yet to obtain 
a knowledge of Double Entry. In pointing out the various methods by 
which books and accounts m-ay he fraudulently vitiated, the author has given 
additional value to his publication, and rendered an essential service to the 
mercantile community. — N. Y. Mercantile Advertiser. 

Here is a new work on a very important subject, that is highly recom- 
mended by good judges. Its object is to furnish a treatise simple in its illus- 
trations, and comprehensive in all the information requisite for the practical 
accountant. The book contains excellent observations on the studies and 
qualifications of a merchant, and concludes with a glossary or explanation of 
commercial terms. — Boston Morning Post. 

As the pursuit of money in this country seems to be the ruling desire, 
it appears to us that no work can be offered to the community generally, 
which is related so intimately to their prosperity; and it is incumbent on ail 
to be acquainted with the principles and practice of an art of which this 
work contains a beautiful, simple and consistent elucidation. We recom* 
mead it to attentioa with much sincerity.— Bostoh Peabx 



Foster's book-keeping. il 

The author of the treatise is a teacher of unquestionable ability. The 
rules and directions for the learner are full and explicit, and the exercises 
have a greater relation to real business transactions than is usual with 
elementary books. — N. Y. Herald. 

Although we have had leisure only for a hasty glance at this work, yet we 
feel justified in commending it to all who are desirous of acquiring a thorough 
knowledge of a qualification so essential not only to the accountant, but to 
every business man. The explanation of commercial terms, which occupies 
several pages, is well worth the price of the book. In this treatise, Mr. 
Foster has furnished ample proof of his ability to give instruction in this 
important branch of commercial education, and we are gratified to learn that 
his rooms are well filled with those who duly appreciate his talents as a 
teacher. — Staten-Islander. , 

The manner in which Book-keeping is frequently taught, conveys a very 
imperfect idea of the practice of merchants. The great difference between 
theory and practice — between the study of an art and its application to prac- 
tical use, is too well known to need remark ; and we think Mr. Foster's 
plan possesses advantages worthy the consideration of all who wish to ac- 
quire the forms and modes of business in a thorough and effectual manner. 
His long experience in the counting house, and skill as a penman, are cir- 
cumstances which qualify Mr. Foster in a peculiar manner for the duties of 
his profession. — Boston Evening Gazette. 

Book-keeping and Penmanship. — Perkins & Marvin have just pub- 
lished a new edition of Foster's Book-keeping, revised, enlarged and im- 
proved. To render the work still more worthy the attention of merchants 
and men of business, the author has appended to the present edition, an 
extensive article on Equation of Payments, a Time Table, and an Explana- 
tion of Commercial Terms, which are of great value. The following is 
from the editor of the New York Emigrant. — Boston Courier. 

In this country, so essentially commercial, there are few works that 
demand a more careful examination than those which profess to teach the 
art of keeping accounts. They are the mainspring of mercantile action, 
showing, in brief view, the history, and effects of all the transactions in the 
trading of an individual or of a copartnery. It is therefore with no cursory 
perusal of this work, that we venture to give. it our especial commendation. 
The system which it teaches, is founded upon correct principles ; it clearly 
exhibits the details of business, and makes the set of books which are 
produced upon its plan, a perfect epitome of their owners' transactions. It 
is simple but clear, its rules are few, but obviously correct; and we are 
assured that a careful study of Book-keeping, under Mr. Foster's tuition, 
will fit a young man for the management of any merchants' accounts, 
however extensive or intricate. 

Foster^ s Graduated Copy-books. — These form part of the instruments of 
the admirable system pursued by Mr. Foster, in teaching that useful accom- 
plishment. Penmanship. They proceed from the most simple elements of 
written letters, up to complete sentences in running hand ; and are so far 
from being an invention of quackery, that they admirably facilitate the 
endeavors of the pupil, and relieve the labors of the teacher. To those who 
desire to practise in private, and to keep up a free and correct style, we 
would recommend that they constantly keep a set of these excellent copy<= 
books at hand, and employ themselves ia Use early as well as in ths latter 
parts of ths 8eri8».-~N. 7. Emiokamt. 



12 Foster's penmanship. 

Mr. B. F. Foster, so well known as an able and accomplished teacher of 
Book-keeping, has just published a new work on this subject, which is 
evidently one of great merit. Jt embraces the latest and most modern 
improvements in the science. Mr. Foster himself has had the advantage 
of extensive practical experience as an accountant, which is always a 
primary requisite in the art of conveying instruction. — Green Banker. 

The excellence of Mr. Foster's system, and its acknowledged superiority 
over others, is, we believe, fully admitted ; and within a short period it has 
been very extensively adopted in the practice of the first commercial houses 
in our principal cities. The object has been to furnish schools and aicademies 
witli a work on this subject, so simple in its illustrations, as to be easily 
understood by those who are unacquainted with the art; and yet so com- 
prehensive as to afford all the information requisite for the practical account- 
ant. The author has aimed not 'to promulgate new or fanciful theories, but 
rather to select information from the best sources, and to embody the excel- 
lencies of the most approved writers on the subject. That he has succeeded, 
the rapid sale of theiirst edition affords the most satisfactory evidence. 

The present edition has been revised, and in some respects improved; 
and is besides rendered more valuable to practical accountants and men of 
business, by the addition of an extensive article on Equation of Payments, 
together with a Time Table, useful in calculating interest, «Se.c. — New 
Bedford Mercury. 

*^* The design of this work is to exhibit a view of Book-keeping as 
actually practised among well informed merchants, and to furnish learners 
with a text-hook so clear in its illustrations as to be easily understood, and 
yet so comprehensive as to afford all the information requisite for the 
practical accountant. It contains the latest improvements in the art, and 
will be found a useful guide to the learner, the merchant, and the man of 
business. 



2. THE ART OF RAPID WRITING ILLUSTRATED 
AND EXPLAINED ; to which is added an elucidation of the 
Angular and Anti-Angular Systems. By B. F. Foster. 1 vol. 
8vo., with plates. 

The bold, flowing, graceful writing, distributed throughout this work, is 
enough to prove that the author is a skilful and competent teacher. The 
plan is novel, simple and ingenious, and admirably adapted to secure the 
attainment of fine penmanship. — N. Y. Evening Star. 

We conscientiously recommend this system to all who are intrusted with 
the education of youth, or who feel a natural anxiety for the progress of 
their children in so useful an accomplishment as that of penmanship. — 
Boston Mercantile Journal. 

The rules laid down in this treatise are sound, and if duly followed out 
will lead to excellence. — New York American. 

Mr. Foster pretends to teach that style of writing which is wanted by 
men of business, and judging by the fac-siraile in his book, and by what we 



COPY BOOKS. 1$ 

ourselves have seen in his school, we are disposed to recommend the work 
most heartily, and to place great confidence in the teacher. — Nevi^ Englanl- 
Galaxy. 

There is nothing wanting in this new system to insure to a pupil of 
(Ordinary capacity, the acquisition of a hand-writing in which the utmost 
legibility, expedition and elegance are united. It is founded on the most 
simple, natural and philosophical principles. — Boston Evening Gazette. 

Experience has abundantly proved, that a free and quick hand-writing 
can be acquired by this process in a very few lessons ; an advanlnge which 
the old svstem does not offer at the end of two years' application. — Albany 
Evening Journal. ^ 

Mr. Foster's Treatise is written with conciseness and perspicuity, and is 
well worthy the attention of all who are interested in this branch of educa- 
tion. — Boston Courier. 



3. FOSTER'S ELEMENTARY COPY-BOOKS, designed 
to render the acquisition of Penmanship simple, progressive, and 
agreeable; to save Teachers the trouble of setting copies, and to 
furnish schools and families with a practical system by which 
the art may be taught with facility and correctness. Nos. 1 to 8. 

%* The slope of the letters, the thickness of the down strokes, and the 
points where the hair strokes commence, are all indicated in the ruling with 
mathematical exactness, which produces a constant check on carelessness 
and inadvertency, and the learner is thus enabled to acquire an elegant and 
masterly use of the pen in one third of the time usually devoted to this ob- 
ject. 

DESCKIPTION OF THE COPY-BOOKS. 

No. 1, is designed for beginners. The copies are placed at the 
top of each page, and consist of straight marks and exercises on the 
turns; leading progressively from the simplest rudiments of the art 
to the formation of letters. 

No. 2, is a continuation of No. 1, and contains a series of exercises 
systematically arranged, which are designed to discipline the muscular 
powers of the fingers, and to prepare the learner for the easy execu- 
tion of large text hand. 

No. 3, contains the letters of the alphabet, arranged according to 
similarity, with reeded lines and grooved spaces to guide the learner 
in the formation of each letter, together with large text copies. 

No. 4, contains an alphabetical set of text hand copies, with outline 
capitals ; designed and engraved in the first style of excellence. 

No. 5, is a continuation of the preceding No. and consists of a 
series of medium or round-hand copies, each beginning with a capital, 
and is designed to prepare the learner for small-hand. 



14 Foster's copy books^ 

No. 6, consists of small, round-hand exercises, and contains s 
set of small-hand copies, alphabetically arranged, preparatory to the 
lessons in running-hand. 

Nos. 7 and 8, complete the system, and consist of exercises in 
current-hand ; being an improved plan of teaching mercantile pen- 
manship. The specific design of the exercises in No. 7 and 8 is 
to teach swift writing. 

The cover upon each book contains practical directions to teachers 
and pupils, rules for holding the pen, position of the body, pen-making, 
&c. ; the whole illustrated with engravings, so that there is nothing 
wanting in this new system, to insure to a pupil of ordinary capacity, 
the acquisition of a hand-writing in which the utmost legibilityy 
expedition, and elegance are combined. 



These Copy-Books, are the result of ten years' experience of one of the 
first teachers in the United States, and they cannot fail to secure to the 
learner a legible current-hand writing in a much less time than is usually 
consumed. Their low price, puts it in the power of most persons to avail 
themselves of their advantages. Each page contains an engraved copy, 
and is ruled so that the pupil cannot fail to learn the shape and proportion 
of the letters. — Eastport Sentikel. 

Mr. Foster has devoted himself successfully to the improvement of the art 
of writing, and has exhibited great ingenuity in devising a system which will 
not only relieve teachers from the trouble of setting copies, ruling, &c., but 
completely obviate the difficulties which have hitherto embarrassed young 
learners in their early attempts with the pen ; the simplicity and novelty of 
the plan enabling the pupil to proceed in his efforts with pleasure, and with- 
out labor. Not one in a hundred of our primary schools, ever turns out a 
single superior penman. But let this system be adopted with resolution, 
and pursued with perseverance, and they will annually supply their thousands. 
— European, 

Foster's Elementary Copy-Books, are an entirely new invention, unique in 
principle and the best calculated to impart ease in penmanship, of any that 
we have seen. This plan is " a labor-saving machine " of incalculable 
value, both to teacher and pupil, by which the latter cannot fail to acquire, 
without loss of time, a uniform, correct hand-writing. — Morning News. 

1 am glad to see " Foster's Elementary Copy-Books," and glad to per- 
ceive they are gaining a deserved popularity. There is no department of 
elementary education which has suffered more from injudicious, or, rather, 
injurious teaching, than penmanship; and I am of opinion that Foster's sys- 
tem o*f instruction is calculated to work a certain and happy reform. 

Frederick Emerson. 
Boston^ February 6, 1836. 

Immediately after the publication of Foster's Copy-Books, they were 
introduced into the Salem Classical School, in consequence of the 
very favorable impression which I had received from an examination of 
bis work on Penmanship. I felt persuaded that practical books from the 
same author, would enable us to follow up the system with decided advan- 



COMMERCIAL CORRESPONDENCE. 15 

tage. We have not been disappointed. They fully come up to our wishes. 
A very prominent and excellent feature in the books is, that a teacher, who 
may not yet have formed a method for himself, or who may not be able to 
do so to his own satisfaction, may, by the use of these works, be put at 
once not only into possession of a practical system, but of all the means 
and facilities for successfully following it out. 

H. K. Oliver. 
Salem, January 25, 1836. 

I have used " Foster's Elementary Copy-Books " in teaching, and I 
think them well calculated to form correct habits of Penmanship in the 
young learner, and to eradicate bad ones in the older pupil. I therefore 
confidently recommend them to parents and teachers, as being the best 
principles of Penmanship with which I am acquainted; and, if rightly used> 
will save much time both to teachers and scholars. 

Gerard Bdshnell. 

JVorwich, (Conn.) February 6, 1836. 

My opinion of " Foster's Elementary Copy-Books," is decidedly favor- 
able. The excellencies of this system consist, in the first place, in teach' 
ing the young •pupil the correct use of the pen. The second peculiar ad' 
vantage is, they guide the young beginner. This is in accordance with 
nature. The parent leads the child in its first efforts in walking. Why 
not guide its hand in its first efforts in writing .-' At least, why not guide 
the pen until it shall be so habituated in making the letters as to contract 
no bad habits ? The reeded lines in these Copy-Books, serve as a guide^ 
which, if obeyed, will lead to skill in the art of Penmanship. 

John Stores. 

Norwich Female Academy, Feb. 6, 1836. 



4. AN ALPHABETICAL SET OF SMALL HAND 
COPIES, adapted to Foster's System of Penmanship ; designed 
and engraved in a superior style. 



5. THE CLERK'S GUIDE, OR COMMERCIAL COR- 
RESPONDENCE ; comprising Letters of Introduction, Letters 
of Credit, and General Business, with forms of Invoices, Bills 
Parcels, Bills of Exchange, Account-sales, and an Appendix, 
containing Advice to young Tradesmen and Shopkeepers, Equa- 
tion of Payments, Commercial Terms, &c. By B. F. Foster. 
1 vol. 12rao. 



TESTIMONIALS' 

Extract from the Report of a Committee appointed to award 
premiums for Penmanship in the Albany Academy. 

In awarding the premiums, the committee experienced much 
embarrassment from the almost equal proficiency exhibited by 
the pupils. It is in fact impossible, without denying the evidence 
before us, to dispute the advantages of the system taught by Mr. 
Foster, and the committee recommend it as superior to all others 
with which they are acquainted, 

Richard Yates, \ 
Theodore Olcott, > Committee. 
Henry Bartow, j 



Extract from the Report of a Committee appointed to attend the 
examination of the pupils in the Albany JFemale Seminary. 

The specimens of writing exhibited, afford the most satisfac- 
tory evidence of improvement in this art, and tend at once to 
confirm the opinion now nearly universal, of the great superiority 
of the system pursued by Mr. Foster, and to advance his high 
reputation as an accomplished teacher. 

Alfred Conkling, \ 

Edward C. Delavan, > Committee. 

Samuel S. Fowler, ) 



Mr. Foster is unquestionably the first writing master in this 
city, — if not in this country, — and so far as much observation, 
and an acquaintance with him and his system, authorize us to 
speak, — utterly free from that humbug and quackery which dis- 
grace not merely the profession, but, in some of its results, the 
whole Christian community. Writing is an art valuable in itself, 
beyond what most persons are ready to admit. And it is not 
only valuable in itself, but the easy, elegant penman will extend 
his order and neatness into the whole circle of his habits, — 
intellectual, social and moral ;— at least such is the tendency. 
He who effects a reform in this department, will, in our view 
be a great public benefactor. — Boston Moral Reformer. 



We are personally acquainted with Mr. Foster, and take great 
pleasure in recommending his establishment to the notice of our 
fellow-citizens. We have examined his system in detail, — have 
observed his mode of instruction in full operation, — and are fully 
impressed with the practicability and utility of his plan. It 
facilitates beyond all other methods, the attainment of a free, 
elegant, and rapid business hand. — Boston. Republican. 






/^ 



"^ ^-"^^ji^^ ^ 



EDUCATION REFORM. 



I ih 



REVIEW OF WYSE 



jON 



THE NECESSITY OF 



A NATIONAL SYSTEM OP EDUCATION, 



COMPRISING 



THE SUBSTANCE OP THAT WORK, SO FAR AS RELATES TO eOMjMOW; 
SCHOOL ANP POPULAR EDUCATION.. 



BY B. F. FOSTER 



S NEW-YORK: 
WILEY AND FUTNAM, 

mx BROADWAY. 

183X. 



This pamphlet containa T.sheets 



the postage on which will be, if not over 100 miles, 10 centf i 
if over 100 miles, 17 cents. 



Juai published, andjbr sale at 183 Broadway, 

THE COUNTING-HOUSE MANUAL, or, Merchant's, 
Banker's, and Tradesman's Assistant. By B. F. Foster, 
Accountant. Author of a new " Treatise on Commercial 
Book-keeping," " The Clerk's Guide," &c. Frieze $1 25. 

, ■ From tjie Evening Post. 

This is a convenient manualyccmtaimng'riiueh useful informa- 
tion, -which men of business find it indispensable to obtain from 
some quarter. The first part embraces a sumraai-y of the laws 
and usages relative to bills and notes, intending to guard the 
merchant against the losses aud litigations, frequently arising 
from inattention or want of proper information ; showing the 
proper steps to be taken to preserve the legal claim on dr-awers, 
acceptors, endorsers, &c. Next follows tables for ascertaining 
instantly, by inspection, when any bill or note will fall due, 
drawn or accepted any day of the year ; together with informa- 
tion respecting the modes of conducting business generally— 
the value of foreign monies, and a system of rules for the equa- 
tion of payments. 

From the New- York Albion. 

A remarkably useful and well arranged compendium of in- 
formation upon the subject of which it treats. There are the 
laws and usages of bills of exchange, with the requisite features 
of these documents ; some curious and important circumstances 
with regard to the maturity of bills and notes ; tables showing 
when notes become due at any date commencing in any month ; 
rates of commissions ; various other tables of importance ; and 
rules for the equation of payments. All these appear to have 
been prepared with great care and accuracy, and we believe 
will be found extensively useful in every counting-house. 

From the Neio- York Sun. 
Here is a work of evident utility, convenience and acquracy 
containing a series of tables, showing when notes, though dated 
on different days, fall due on the same, and when one day's 
difference in date will make several in the time of payment ; to- 
gether with amass of information relative to exchange, value of 
money, &c. We should judge this to be an invaluable assistant 
for those for whom it was prepared. In size it is convenient, 
in arrangement for reference clear, and in mechanical execution 
neat. 



WSLLUM 03B0RN, FRIJMTER, 88 WILLIAM-STHEET. 




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